Groups in economics

Groups play an important role in economics. Many economic activities take place within or between groups. This thesis describes a number of laboratory experiments studying group decision making in economics. The aim of the first two experiments is to study the differences between groups and individuals in competitive situations. We aim to disentangle the different possible effects of group decision making - that groups may make better decisions than individuals, that groups are more competitive - and investigate the role of the group decision making process herein. The third experiment studies how leadership can help overcome within-group coordination problems.