Multi‐battle Contests: An Experimental Study

We examine behavior of subjects in simultaneous and sequential multi‐battle contests, where each individual battle is modeled as an all‐pay auction with complete information. In simultaneous best‐of‐three contests, subjects are predicted to make positive bids in all three battles, but we find that subjects often make positive bids in only two battles. In sequential contests, theory predicts sizable bids in the first battle and no bids in the...