Figure 6
Example for method of sorting participants. At the beginning of the experiment, participants are ranked in terms of their normative views for contributions relative to returns. In the example presented here, there are 12 participants sorted into 4 groups. When sorting for normative agreement, we first form a group of the three highest-ranked participants (1–3), then of the remaining participants we again form a group of the three highest-ranked participants (4–6), and so on until all participants are grouped. Compared to the condition with normative agreement, in the condition with normative disagreement we select the highest-ranked low-return participant from the first group in the first half of the groups (ordered in terms of support for contributions relative to returns), and replace it with the lowest-ranked low-return participant from the first group in the second half of the groups, and repeat this procedure with the remaining groups. In this way, the extent of normative disagreement (in terms of rank-differences) is equal for all groups.
