Why Weaker Competitors Give Up—and How to Keep Them in the Game
Anastasia Antsygina, Assistant Professor at HSE University’s Faculty of Economic Sciences, has developed a prize distribution model that maximises competitor engagement. She proposed revising the traditional ‘winner-takes-all’ approach and, in certain cases, offering a small reward even to those who have lost. According to her, this could increase participant motivation and make the competition more intense. The findings of her research were published in the Economic Theory journal.
Modern research shows that in competitions—whether a sports tournament, school competition, or scientific paper contest—people tend to work harder when only one prize is at stake. Losers are not typically rewarded. This is thought to increase competitor motivation.
However, Anastasia Antsygina has concluded that this is not always the case and that it largely depends on the structure of the prizes. According to her, in situations where the ‘all or nothing’ rule applies, weaker participants often quickly lose motivation, realising they have little or no chance of winning. This makes the contest less competitive and thus unattractive for its organiser.
To understand this mechanism, Anastasia Antsygina created a mathematical model of a two-person competition in which the prize consisted of several components, for example, money and rating points. She argued that this approach was more realistic, as people often compete for multiple types of rewards at once, such as income, status, or reputation.
The constructed model demonstrated that with a ‘winner-takes-all’ reward system, the weaker participant indeed gave up quickly. However, when the loser was guaranteed a small but meaningful prize, the situation changed: both participants continued to actively compete, and the competition became more intense. A particularly notable effect occurred when an additional reward was provided in a form that was relatively more valuable to the favourite.
To verify these findings, Anastasia Antsygina turned to data from professional tennis, specifically focusing on Grand Slam and Masters tournaments. These competitions provide players not only with prize money but also with rating points. Her analysis showed that while cash prizes did not significantly affect the likelihood of a favourite winning, a change in ranking points did have a significant impact on that likelihood. Moreover, its value depended on the ratio of the participants’ strengths. In matches with a clear favourite, an increase in the ranking gap of 100 points reduced the probability of the favourite’s victory by approximately 7%: the outsider began to fight more actively. In matches with more equal opponents, the same factor, on the contrary, increased the odds of the favourite by about 8%.
Anastasia Antsygina
‘The study shows that the structure of multidimensional prizes directly affects participant behaviour in the competition. A small but valuable reward for the loser can keep each participant motivated and increase competition. These conclusions are applicable not only in sports, but also in business, education, and other areas where active participation and the level of competition are important,’ Anastasia Antsygina believes.
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