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Effect of self-esteem on social interactions during
the Ultimatum Game
V. Paz, E. Nicolaisen-Sobesky, E. Collado, S.
Horta, C. Rey, M. Rivero, P. Berriolo, M. Díaz,
M. Otón, A. Pérez, G. Fernández-Theoduloz, Á.
Cabana, V.B. Gradin
PII: S0165-1781(16)31037-X
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.psychres.2016.12.063
Reference: PSY10348
To appear in: Psychiatry Research
Received date: 15 June 2016
Revised date: 5 December 2016
Accepted date: 5 December 2016
Cite this article as: V. Paz, E. Nicolaisen-Sobesky, E. Collado, S. Horta, C. Rey,
M. Rivero, P. Berriolo, M. Díaz, M. Otón, A. Pérez, G. Fernández-Theoduloz,
Á. Cabana and V.B. Gradin, Effect of self-esteem on social interactions during
the Ultimatum Game, Psychiatry Research,
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.psychres.2016.12.063
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Effect of self-esteem on social interactions during the
Ultimatum Game
V. Paz, E. Nicolaisen-Sobesky, E. Collado, S. Horta, C. Rey, M. Rivero, P.
Berriolo, M. Díaz, M. Otón, A. Pérez, G. Fernández-Theoduloz, Á. Cabana, V.
B. Gradin*
CIBPsi, Faculty of Psychology, Universidad de la República, Uruguay
*Correspondence to: Faculty of Psychology, Universidad de la Repúlica, Tristán
Narvaja 1674, Montevideo, Uruguay. Tel.: +(598) 24008555 286.
victoriagradin@gmail.com
Abstract
Self-esteem is an attitude formed by self-evaluation based on positive and negative aspects of oneself. Low self-
esteem is a risk factor for psychiatric disorders and is especially associated with social difficulties. Recently,
behavioral economics has allowed the quantitative study of social interactions. We investigated the association
between self-esteem and interpersonal problems and whether self-esteem modulates behavior and emotions during
an economic task, the Ultimatum Game (UG). In this task participants accept or reject fair/unfair monetary offers
from others. Low (LSE, n=40) and high (HSE, n=45) self-esteem participants were assessed in their interpersonal
problems and psychiatric symptoms using self-reported questionnaires, and were compared on their decision
making and emotional response during the UG. LSE was associated with depression and anxiety symptoms. In
addition, LSE was associated with interpersonal problems, especially in the domains of socially inhibited,
nonassertive, overly accommodating, self-sacrificing and cold/distant. During the UG, LSE women reported more
anger towards unfair offers than HSE women. Our findings suggest that low self-esteem individuals experience
high distress by interpersonal problems in several domains. Importantly, low self-esteem in women seems to be
associated with an accentuated emotional response to unfair social exchanges. These results may contribute to treat
social difficulties in this population.
1. Introduction
Self-esteem can be defined as the degree to which a person likes, values, and accepts himself
or herself (Rogers, 1951). Numerous studies suggest that self-esteem has a significant impact
on an individual’s health and quality of life (Trzesniewski et al., 2006; Somerville et al.,
2010). For instance, individuals with low self-esteem (LSE) are more likely to drop out of
school, have poor economic prospects (Trzesniewski et al., 2006) and rate their health worse
than people with high self-esteem (HSE) (Glendinning, 1998). Furthermore, low self-esteem
is a risk factor for various psychiatric disorders, such as: depression, social anxiety,
posttraumatic stress disorder (Pyszczynski and Greenberg, 1987; Tennen and Affleck, 1993;
Izgic et al., 2004; Boscarino and Adams, 2009), substance dependence (Trzesniewski et al.,
2006), avoidant personality disorder, learning disabilities and attention deficit hyperactivity
(Association, 1994).
Importantly, self-esteem plays a crucial role in social interactions. Several studies have
reported that people with low self-esteem focus their attention on how others see them, which
results in high sensitivity to criticism (Rosenberg and Owens, 2001; Baumeister et al., 2003),
rejection (Murray et al., 2002; Sommer and Baumeister, 2002) and interpersonal distress
(Tennen and Affleck, 1993). This high sensitivity leads people with low self-esteem to exhibit
self-protective behaviors such as hiding their thoughts and feelings (Rosenberg and Owens,
2001; Baumeister et al., 2003), avoiding interactions (Orth et al., 2008) and reducing
interpersonal closeness following conflicts (Murray et al., 2002). These behaviors impair
social relationships (Orth et al., 2008), and therefore increase feelings of loneliness in people
with low self-esteem (Rosenberg and Owens, 2001; Baumeister et al., 2003). This highlights
the importance of investigating interpersonal problems in people with low self-esteem.
The systematic and controlled study of social exchanges has been challenging, as social
interactions are difficult to elicit and quantify (King-Casas and Chiu, 2012). Recently
however, behavioral economics tasks have provided a framework to operationalize and
quantify social interactions. These tasks focus on interpersonal interactions, facilitating the
controlled study of social concepts, such as fairness, altruism, cooperation and punishment
(Fehr and Schmidt, 1999; Camerer and Fehr, 2002).
One of the most widely studied tasks of behavioral economics is the Ultimatum Game (UG)
(Guth et al., 1982). The Ultimatum Game allows the study of decision making and emotional
reactions in response to fair and unfair social situations (Harle and Sanfey, 2007; Crockett et
al., 2008; Rilling and Sanfey, 2011). In the Ultimatum Game, the participant (‘responder’)
receives offers from other players (‘proposers’) on how to split a sum of money and the
participant has to accept or reject the offers. If the offer is accepted, the sum is divided
between the participant and the proposer as proposed and, if it is rejected, both players receive
zero on that trial (Rilling and Sanfey, 2011). From a purely rational perspective, the responder
should accept all offers, as even the smallest amount is better than nothing. However,
numerous studies show that low offers (typically less than 20-30% of the total amount) tend
to be rejected. These rejections are thought to relate to participants opposing perceived unfair
offers (Sanfey et al., 2003).
The Ultimatum Game has been used to study how psychiatric disorders such as depression
(Harle et al., 2010; Destoop et al., 2012; Radke et al., 2013; Scheele et al., 2013; Gradin et al.,
2014; Wang et al., 2014), anxiety (Grecucci et al., 2013; Wu et al., 2013) and personality
disorders (Koenigs et al., 2010; Polgár et al., 2014) can alter decision making and emotional
responses during social interactions. In addition, the Ultimatum Game has been used to study
the role of emotional states (Harle and Sanfey, 2007; Harlé et al., 2012), hormones and
neurotransmitters (Crockett et al., 2008; Emanuele et al., 2008; Kopsida et al., 2016), and
emotional dispositions (Dunn et al., 2010) on social behavior. However, to our knowledge, it
has not been investigated yet whether low and high self-esteem participants differ in their
decision-making and emotional response to social interactions in the Ultimatum Game. This
was the aim of the present study. Given that low self-esteem people exhibit high sensitivity to
social situations (Tennen and Affleck, 1993; Rosenberg and Owens, 2001; Murray et al.,
2002; Sommer and Baumeister, 2002; Baumeister et al., 2003) and high levels of negative
affect (Baumeister et al., 2003; Orth, 2012), we hypothesize that they will report higher levels
of negative emotions when facing unfair offers during the Ultimatum Game than people with
high self-esteem. This in turn could bias the decision-making process to higher rejection rates
of unfair offers than those observed in people with high self-esteem. Alternatively, it is also
possible that assertiveness problems (Percell et al., 1974) and difficulties in facing conflicts
(Murray et al., 2002) lead people with low self-esteem to have a lower rejection rate of unfair
offers than people with high self-esteem, even though they experience higher levels of
negative emotions.
Additionally, we investigated the association between self-esteem and interpersonal problems
using the Inventory of Interpersonal Problems (IIP-64). This inventory identifies a person´s
most salient interpersonal difficulties in eight domains (domineering/controlling;
vindictive/self-centered; cold/distant; socially inhibited; nonassertive; overly accommodating;
self-sacrificing and intrusive/needy). To our knowledge, there are no previous studies using
the IIP-64 to compare groups of high vs. low self-esteem on interpersonal distress. As low
self-esteem is associated with high interpersonal distress it is relevant to investigate
interpersonal problems in this population. Based on the self-esteem construct (Rosenberg and
Owens, 2001; Murray et al., 2002; Baumeister et al., 2003; Orth et al., 2008), we hypothesize
that low self-esteem participants would report more interpersonal problems, particularly in the
domains of socially inhibited, nonassertive, overly accommodated and self-sacrificing.
2. Methods
2.1Participants
The study was conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki(Association, 2013)
and was approved by the local Research Ethics Committee. Written informed consent was
obtained from all the participants. Participants between 18 and 35 years of age were recruited
from the University and associated social networks. Subjects interested in participating
(n=805) read the study information sheet and completed two self-esteem scales (State Self-
Esteem Scale (SSES), (Heatherton and Polivy, 1991); Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (RSES)
(Rosenberg, 1965; Rojas-Barahona et al., 2009) on a website specifically designed for
recruitment. Eligibility to participate was ascertained by scores on the trait self-esteem scale
(RSES). Specifically, voluntaries classified as low trait self-esteem individuals (score ≤ 25,
n=63) were invited to participate in an experimental session matched with a high trait self-
esteem control group (score ≥ 30, n=48). Before the experimental session, participants also
completed on the web page the Inventory of Interpersonal Problems (IIP) (Horowitz et al.,
1988; Salazar et al., 2010), which quantifies interpersonal problems in a number of domains:
domineering/controlling; vindictive/self-centered; cold/distant; socially inhibited;
nonassertive; overly accommodating; self-sacrificing and intrusive/needy. During the
experimental session, participants completed the RSES again. Participants in the experimental
session who were assigned to a different self-esteem category from the category determined
from their previous website scale categorization were excluded (n=27).The final sample was
composed of 40 participants with low self-esteem (range of RSES scores 15-25) and 45
participants with high self-esteem (range of RSES scores 30-40). Participants from both
groups did not differ in age, sex, study area and years of education (see Table 1 for details).
All participants had Spanish as their native language. Exclusion criteria for the two groups
were a history of severe psychiatric or neurological illness or a disability that could impair
performance in the task. One high self-esteem and eleven low self-esteem participants were
taking psychiatric medication (the high self-esteem participant was taking low doses of
antidepressants and anxiolytics for four months before the study; the low self-esteem
participants were taking antidepressants, anxiolytics, antipsychotics and/or hypnotics). The
analysis presented in this paper includes data from these participants. When these participants
were excluded the results remained statistically significant.
2.2Questionnaires
At the beginning of the experimental session the following ratings were obtained: Beck
Depression Inventory (BDI-II) (Beck et al., 1961; Sanz et al., 2005); Rosenberg Scale (RSES)
(Rosenberg, 1965; Rojas-Barahona et al., 2009); State Self-esteem Scale (SSES) (Heatherton
and Polivy, 1991); Self-Concept Form 5 (AF5) (García and Musitu, 1999); Positive Affect
Negative Affect Scale (PANAS) (Watson et al., 1988; Dufey and Fernández, 2012);
Liebowitz Social Anxiety Scale (LSAS) (Liebowitz, 1987; Bobes et al., 1999); and State-Trait
Anxiety Inventory for Adults (STAI) (Spielberger et al., 1970; Spielberger et al., 1982).
Spanish versions of the rating scales were used and administered in the same order for all
subjects.
2.3. Behavioral task: Ultimatum Game (UG)
Participants were instructed on how to play the Ultimatum Game in the responder role (Fig.
1). Participants were told that during the game they would be presented with offers made by
two other players regarding how to split a sum of money. On each trial, the participant would
be presented with one offer made by one of the two co-players. The participant would have to
accept or reject the offer. In case of accepting, the money would be divided between the
participant and the co-player as proposed. If rejected, both players would receive zero on that
trial. Participants were told that they would be playing with real people through an intranet
network. In reality, the task was preprogrammed and the two supposed co-players were part
of the research team. This aspect of the study was necessary in order to present participants
with a standardized task whilst ensuring the social validity of the task. In order to minimize
deception, when participants were trained on how to play the Ultimatum Game, they were
told the statement "not all aspects of the task can be revealed at this moment, but when you
finish the experiment there will be time to discuss the study in full length". Once the
participants were instructed on how to play the game, they trained with a practice test on how
to accept and reject offers.
After practicing, another member of the research team would come into the lab and ask the
participant to come to a different room where she would meet the other two supposed co-
players. The participant was told that the other players had been in other completing
questionnaires and similarly trained in the Ultimatum Game. Once in that room, the three
players took a number from a box. They were told that each one of them (once they were back
into their original room) would have to generate specific offers for each of the other two co-
players (e.g. the player with the number 1 would have to propose 30 offers to player number 2
and 30 offers to player number 3). This was implemented in order to make the participant feel
that she would be making offers for specific individuals, and that the offers that she would
receive were made specifically for her. The participant and the co-players were told that all of
them would receive a small non-monetary reward according to their earnings during the
game. For the participant, those earnings would depend on the offers that she accepted as well
as on the offers that she would have proposed and that the co-players accepted. It was
explained that all three of them would meet at the end of the session to receive their reward.
This procedure was implemented so that during the game, participants would believe that they
would meet again with the co-players and so the social effect would be reinforced. To
minimize the effect of other variables, it was checked that the participant did not know the
other supposed players, that the interaction between them was brief and that the two co-
players and the participant were from the same sex.
Once the participant was back in the original room, she answered several written questions to
check for understanding. Afterwards, the participant played in the proposer role made 30
offers for each of the co-players. Once this was completed, the participant was told that their
offers would be uploaded into the network (as well as the offers made by the co-players) so
that the game could proceed. Finally, the participant played the Ultimatum Game in the
responder role, accepting or rejecting the offers. Of note, the participant was told that the
offers were already uploaded (i.e. the offers were not in real time), and therefore their
decisions would not affect their future offers.
Subjects performed 60 trials of the task, 20 trials of each condition (fair, medium and unfair
offers). The task lasted ~10 minutes. ‘Fair’, ‘medium’ and ‘unfair’ offers spanned a
proportion range from 0.40-0.50, 0.27-0.33 and 0.08-0.23 of the endowment, respectively.
Each participant was presented with the same set of offers. The offers were matched for
material utility (Crockett et al., 2010; Gradin et al., 2014). This means that the same amount
of money could represent a large percentage in a fair offer and a small percentage in an unfair
offer. This allows investigation of behavioral responses to fairness whilst controlling for
material value.
After finishing the task, participants rated their subjective emotional reaction to a subset of
fair, medium and unfair offers. The subsets contained six offers each and were matched for
material utility. For each offer, participants rated the following feelings on nine-point Likert
scales: happy, angry, sad and betrayed. In addition, participants rated how happy, angry, sad
and anxious they felt, knowing that at the end of the session they were going to meet again
with their co-players. We chose to rate the emotions retrospectively as we did not want to
risk biasing decisions during the task. It has been proposed (Pillutla and Murnighan, 1996;
Dunn et al., 2010), that making participants reflect about their emotions immediately post trial
could serve to regulate emotions, affect decisions and in general change the experience of the
task.
At the end of the experimental session, the participants were debriefed. None of the
participants reported discomfort relating to the cover story. Six participants reported not
believing they were playing with real co-players and so were excluded from the analysis of
the Ultimatum Game data. All participants received the same reward (a cinema ticket and a
stationery pack).
2.4 Analysis of psychiatric symptoms and interpersonal problems
Two-way ANOVAs were used to study the effect of self-esteem and sex in depressive
symptoms (measured by BDI-II), state-trait anxiety symptoms (measured by STAI), social
anxiety symptoms (measured by LSAS), positive and negative affect (measured by PANAS)
and interpersonal problems (measured by IIP-64).
2.5 Analysis of behavioral data and emotional responses to the
Ultimatum Game
Twelve participants were excluded from the Ultimatum Game analysis (six for not believing
the cover story, five due to technical issues and one for accepting all the offers). A two factor
(self-esteem and sex) ANOVA was used to investigate the average ratio (amount offered/total
amount) of the offers made by the participant to the co-players when acting in the proposer
role.
Binary logistic generalized estimating equations (GEE) models were used to analyze
participant´s decisions during the game. GEE allows adjusting for correlations due to repeated
observations within each participant over the trials. We used a logit link function and assumed
an exchangeable working correlation structure. The statistical significance level was set at .05.
The participant´s decision (accept or reject the offer) was entered as the binary dependent
variable. The variable subject was entered as a repeated effect variable. The fixed effects were
self-esteem, sex and type of offer (fair, medium and unfair).
Repeated measures ANOVA was used to examine the effect of self-esteem, sex and type of
offer (fair, medium and unfair) in the reaction times and emotional responses to the offers
presented in the Ultimatum Game when acting in the responder role. A two factor (self-
esteem and sex) ANOVA was used to study the emotions that participants reported about
knowing that at the end of the session they would meet again with their co-players. The
Greenhouse-Geisser correction was used for non-sphericity.
3. Results
3.1Relationship between self-esteem and psychiatric symptoms
The RSES scores correlated significantly with SSES scores (p<0.001) and AF5 scores
(p<0.001). As expected, self-esteem was found to be linked to depressive symptoms (F (1,
81) = 60.940, p<0.001), trait and state anxiety symptoms (trait: F (1, 81) = 156.276, p<0.001;
state: F (1, 78) = 43.022, p<0.001), social anxiety symptoms (F (1, 81) = 37.076, p<0.001)
(both in the domains of fear/anxiety (F (1, 81) = 46.039, p<0.001) and avoidance (F (1, 81) =
22.147, p<0.001)), and negative affects (F (1, 81) = 42.554, p<0.001), with people with low
self-esteem reporting more severity of these symptoms. In addition, self-esteem was found to
be linked to positive affect (F (1, 81) = 39.745, p<0.001), with low self-esteem subjects
reporting less positive affect (see Table 1). Men reported more anxiety (state) than women (F
(1, 78) = 5.718, p = 0.019). There were no significant interactions.
3.2 Relationship between self-esteem and interpersonal problems
Self-esteem was significantly related to reported interpersonal problems (F (1, 81) = 38.162,
p<0.001), particularly in the domains of socially inhibited (F (1, 81) = 34.793, p<0.001),
nonassertive (F (1, 81) = 64.380, p<0.001), cold/distant (F (1, 81) = 14.741, p<0.001), overly
accommodating (F (1, 81) = 14.768, p<0.001) and self-sacrificing (F (1, 81) = 10.722, p =
0.002), with low self-esteem participants reporting more interpersonal problems in all these
domains (see Fig. 2 and Table 1). Men reported more interpersonal problems in the domains
of vindictive/self-centered (F (1, 81) = 7.651, p = 0.007) and cold/distant (F (1, 81) = 17.005,
p<0.001) than women. There were no significant interactions.
3.3Behavioral results, Ultimatum Game
No significant effect of self-esteem, sex or their interaction was found when participants made
offers in the role of proposer.
A significant main effect of fairness was found (Wald χ2 (2) = 452.51, p<0.001) in the
responses to offers (see Fig. 3 and Table 2). Unfair offers were more likely to be rejected than
medium offers (p<0.001) and fair offers (p<0.001), while medium offers were more likely to
be rejected than fair offers (p<0.001).
A significant main effect of sex was found (Wald χ2 (1) = 5.04, p = 0.025) in the responses to
offers, with men rejecting more offers than women.
There was no significant effect of self-esteem in the rejection rate and neither of the
interactions was significant.
Fairness was found to have an effect on reaction times (F (1.798, 124.038) = 28.403,
p<0.001), with medium offers showing higher response times than fair (p<0.001) and unfair
offers (p<0.001). This may relate to medium offers implying more difficult decisions, as they
are harder to reject compared to unfair offers but not as easy to accept as fair offers. There
was no significant effect of self-esteem or sex in reaction times and neither of the interactions
was significant.
3.4 Emotional response
After playing the Ultimatum Game, participants rated their subjective emotional reaction to
fair, medium and unfair offers.
For the emotion of happiness, a significant main effect of fairness was found (F (1.450,
98.633) = 220.060, p<0.001), with fair offers eliciting higher happiness ratings than medium
offers (p<0.001) and medium offers eliciting higher happiness ratings than unfair offers
(p<0.001). A main effect of fairness was also found for the emotions of anger (F (1.247,
84.795) = 125.394, p<0.001), sadness (F (1.208, 82.118) = 40.741, p<0.001) and betrayal (F
(1.241, 84.360) = 67.412, p<0.001), with unfair offers eliciting more of these emotions than
medium offers (p<0.001) and, in turn, medium offers triggering more of these emotions than
fair offers (p<0.001). In summary, across all participants increased fairness elicited more
positive affect and less negative affect.
For all of the emotions, no significant main effect of self-esteem and sex was found.
However, in the case of anger, a significant three-way interaction between self-esteem, sex
and fairness was found (F (1.247, 84.795) = 4.433, p=0.030). Decomposition of this
interaction showed that women with low self-esteem reported more anger with unfair offers
than women with high self-esteem (t (39, 0.79) = 2.243 p = 0.031) (see Fig. 4).
Self-esteem had an effect on emotions about meeting again with the co-players, with low self-
esteem participants reporting more anxiety than high self-esteem participants (F (1, 72) =
6.299; p = 0.014) (see Table 2). There was no significant effect of sex or self-esteem on other
emotions reported about the meeting and no interaction was significant.
4. Discussion
This study investigated the relationship between self-esteem and interpersonal problems in
different domains and whether differences in self-esteem modulate decision making and
emotional responses in a social context using the Ultimatum Game.
Low self-esteem was associated with higher levels of interpersonal problems, especially in the
domains of socially inhibited, cold/distant, nonassertive, overly accommodating and self-
sacrificing. This indicates that when interacting with people, individuals with low self-esteem
tend to experience a variety of difficulties that include feelings of anxiety, low connection
with people, severe reluctance to assert themselves and a need to please others. This kind of
difficulties during interpersonal interactions suggests that people with low self-esteem feel a
strong need to be accepted and a high sensitivity to interpersonal stress (Tennen and Affleck,
1993; Lakey et al., 1994). These findings contribute to understand the specific type of
problems that people with low self-esteem experience when interacting with others and may
aid in the development of more refined therapies that aim to overcome these difficulties.
Whilst all the participants responded to increasing unfairness of offers during the Ultimatum
Game with more negative feelings and less positive feelings, self-esteem had an effect on the
emotional response to the game in women. Specifically, women with low self-esteem reported
more anger in response to unfair offers than women with high self-esteem. Interestingly, a
previous study (McClure et al., 2007) that used an economic exchange task involving conflict
and cooperation (the Prisoner's Dilemma) found that adolescent women with
depression/anxiety disorders reported significantly more anger towards their co-players than
women without disorders. Taking into account that low self-esteem is associated to
depression/anxiety (Pyszczynski and Greenberg, 1987; Tennen and Affleck, 1993; Sowislo
and Orth, 2013), our findings and the previous study suggest a stronger anger reaction in
women with low self-esteem and/or mood disorders to social stressors.
According to cognitive theories of depression and anxiety disorders, a negative cognitive style
and patterns of ruminative thinking may lead to low mood and negative affect in people with
mood disorders (Beck, 1979; Beck and Clark, 1997). Similarly, in people with low self-
esteem, stressful social exchanges may trigger negative thoughts about the self and
rumination (Di Paula and Campbell, 2002; Luyckx et al., 2008; Cambron et al., 2009), that in
turn enhance negative feelings (Mor and Winquist, 2002). In our study, receiving unfair offers
from co-players could lead women with low self-esteem to focus on negative aspects of the
self, leading to enhanced feelings of anger. Unlike women, men's self-esteem did not
modulate anger ratings during the Ultimatum Game. This may relate to the sample including
more women than men. Alternatively, it is possible that women with low self-esteem are
particularly reactive to social stressors (Tennen and Affleck, 1993; Birditt and Fingerman,
2003). Work is needed to understand more precisely the interaction of self-esteem and sex on
emotional reactions in social challenges.
Regarding the effect of self-esteem on emotional responses to the meeting with co-players at
the end of the session, participants with low self-esteem reported more anxiety than
participants with high self-esteem. This is consistent with people with low self-esteem having
more state-trait anxiety, social anxiety, social avoidance and interpersonal problems,
especially in the domain of social inhibition.
It was not found that individual differences in self-esteem modulated rejections during the
Ultimatum Game. While self-esteem modulated the emotional response to the Ultimatum
Game, with women with low self-esteem reporting more anger in response to unfair offers
than control women, these feelings were not reflected behaviorally in an increase of their
rejection rate. This may be related to problems with assertiveness (Percell et al., 1974) and
dealing with conflict, as reported for people with low self-esteem.
The Ultimatum Game has been used with depressive and anxious populations. Overall, the
results from these studies have been controversial, with studies reporting either an increase
(Harle and Sanfey, 2007; Radke et al., 2013; Scheele et al., 2013; Wang et al., 2014), a
decrease (Harle et al., 2010; Grecucci et al., 2013) or no change (Destoop et al., 2012; Gradin
et al., 2014) in rejection rates of depressive/anxious participants compared to controls. The
difference in the results might be due to differences in task design, variability in clinical
populations, insufficient statistical power or a combination of these factors (Pulcu and Elliott,
2015). These results illustrate that the effect of mood (and possibly other psychological
variables such as self-esteem) in the behavioral responses to the Ultimatum Game is complex.
Further work is needed to clarify the effect of self-esteem in decision-making associated with
social interactions.
In the present study, it was found that sex modulated decision making, with men rejecting
more offers than women. This result is consistent with the study of Eckel (2001), who found
that the probability for a woman accepting a given offer in the Ultimatum Game was higher
than for a man (Eckel and Grossman, 2001). It is also in agreement with findings from studies
using different behavioral economics tasks. These studies have shown that women reciprocate
more in the trust game (Croson and Buchan, 1999), give more of their endowment in the
dictator game (Eckel and Grossman, 1998), contribute more in the public good game
(Seguino et al., 1996) and are more cooperative in the prisoner´s dilemma (Sibley et al., 1968;
Tedeschi et al., 1969) than men. Overall, these results could indicate that women are more
socially oriented while men are more individually oriented (Eckel and Grossman, 2008).
However, it should be noted that there are also some studies reporting that men are more
cooperative than women (Mack et al., 1971; Brown-Kruse and Hummels, 1993), or do not
find significant differences between sexes (Orbell et al., 1994; Bolton and Katok, 1995).
There are a number of limitations to the present study. First, the sample was limited to
university students in order to better control for age, educational level, socioeconomic
background and overall health variables of the study groups, but this may limit
generalizability of the results. Second, as low self-esteem was associated with depression,
anxiety and negative affect symptoms, it is difficult to disentangle the contribution of each.
Future studies should focus on dissociating these variables to understand their effects on task
performance.
Overall, this study investigated the association between self-esteem and interpersonal
problems, and whether self-esteem modulates behavior and emotional reactions during the
Ultimatum Game. We found that low self-esteem is associated with self-reported
interpersonal problems. During the Ultimatum Game, participants with low self-esteem felt
more anxious than controls about meeting again with their co-players, and women with low
self-esteem expressed more anger towards unfair offers than control women. To our
knowledge, this is the first study to investigate how self-esteem modulates social interactions
using a behavioral economic paradigm. These findings may contribute to elucidate the
cognitive and emotional processes that underlie social interactions in people with low self-
esteem and may help to develop/improve treatments that target social difficulties in this
population.
Contributors
Valentina Paz and Victoria Beatriz Gradin designed, collected and analysed data, interpreted
and drafted results, and prepared the manuscript. Eliana Nicolaisen-Sobesky designed,
collected data, and contributed to interpretation of results and preparation of the manuscript.
Ernestina Collado and Stefany Horta contributed to the design of the study and collected data.
Manuel Rivero collected data and contributed to preparation of the manuscript. Claudio Rey,
Patricia Berriolo, Mauricio Díaz and Marcelo Otón collected data. Alfonso Pérez contributed
to design and data analysis. Gabriela Fernández-Theoduloz contributed to design,
interpretation of results and preparation of the manuscript. Álvaro Cabana contributed to data
analysis and preparation of the manuscript.
Role of the Funding source
This work was supported by CSIC (Sectoral Commission for Scientific Research, Uruguay)
and by a fellowship from ANII (National Agency for Investigation and Innovation, Uruguay)
to Valentina Paz. The funding sources had no role in the design and conduct of the study;
collection, management, analysis, and interpretation of the data; and preparation, review, or
approval of the manuscript.
Conflicts of interest
None.
Acknowledgements
Special thanks to Mario Luzardo and Philip Dixon who helped with statistical analysis, to
Prof. Douglas Steele who helped with editing of the English and to all the volunteers who
participated in the research.
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Fig. 1. Behavioral economic task, Ultimatum Game. (A) The Ultimatum Game.
The participant had up to 6 seconds to make the decision. “Me quedo”: I keep/“Te ofrezco”: I
offer; tr: reaction time. (B) Examples of fair, medium and unfair offers. The offers were
matched for material utility (see text).
Fig.2. Relationship between self-esteem and interpersonal problems.
Participants with low self-esteem reported more interpersonal problems than participants with
high self-esteem in the domains of socially inhibited, nonassertive, overly accommodating,
self-sacrificing and cold/distant. Error bars denote confidence intervals 95%. HSE: High self-
esteem / LSE: Low self-esteem.
Fig.3. Behavioral results, Ultimatum Game. Error bars denote standard deviation.
HSE: High self-esteem / LSE: Low self-esteem.
Fig.4. Emotional response to the Ultimatum Game. Women with low self-esteem
reported more anger towards unfair offers than women with high self-esteem. Error bars
denote standard deviation. HSE: High self-esteem / LSE: Low self-esteem.
Table 1 Participant details.
High Self-esteem (n=45)
Low Self-esteem (n=40)
Significance
Men
Women
Men
Women
17
28
15
25
p=0.979 NS
Age
24.35±4.51
23.46±4.53
22.06±3.19
23.72±4.27
p=0.450 NS
Years of education
14.05±1.85
14.57±2.15
13.86±1.59
14.12±2.42
p=0.438 NS
BDI-II
5.64±4.06
6.46±3.82
18.73±8.40
14.92±7.68
p<0.001
RSES
35.94±3.38
35.89±2.64
21.46±2.85
22.36±2.17
p<0.001
SSES
83.64±8.16
85.07±8.33
58.53±7.61
61.24±13.54
p<0.001
SSES (performance)
30.35±3.72
30.39±2.88
21.40±4.18
21.96±4.91
p<0.001
SSES (social)
30.58±4.52
31.75±2.87
21.66±4.09
23.96±5.84
p<0.001
SSES (appearance)
22.70±2.46
22.92±4.44
15.46±3.54
15.32±5.51
p<0.001
AF5 (academic/professional)
7.45±1.97
7.55±1.17
5.11±1.89
5.71±1.73
p<0.001
AF5 (social)
7.27±1.42
7.35±1.58
4.82±1.85
5.58±2.10
p<0.001
AF5 (emotional)
7.12±1.53
7.29±1.84
4.15±1.68
4.38±1.98
p<0.001
AF5 (family)
8.05±1.14
8.92±0.86
7.08±2.08
6.94±1.67
p<0.001
AF5 (physical)
6.44±1.62
5.65±1.94
3.38±1.57
3.02±1.33
p<0.001
PANAS (positive affects)
33.94±4.77
34.21±5.71
25.00±5.84
26.40±6.83
p<0.001
PANAS (negativeaffect)
19.88±5.08
19.03±3.68
28.33±6.69
26.00±5.91
p<0.001
LSAS
33.88±14.72
30.42±17.13
58.00±21.65
55.12±18.15
p<0.001
LSAS (fear / anxiety)
16.00±7.98
16.21±9.19
31.33±11.13
28.68±8.46
p<0.001
LSAS (avoidance)
17.88±7.96
14.21±9.39
26.66±11.79
26.44±10.55
p<0.001
STAI (state)
11.05±9.12
9.00±5.07
24.93±10.39
18.47±7.64
p<0.001
STAI (trait)
19.29±6.94
17.71±6.47
37.80±5.67
35.88±6.79
p<0.001
IIP
72.23±22.26
61.71±23.42
102.80±25.40
96.52±23.54
p<0.001
IIP(domineering/controlling)
9.11±5.47
7.92±3.37
7.40±3.75
7.76±5.50
p=0.363 NS
IIP (vindictive/self-centered)
7.64±5.46
5.00±3.20
8.33±3.73
6.16±3.36
p=0.293 NS
IIP (cold/distant)
8.23±5.17
4.35±3.61
12.06±3.67
7.96±4.73
p<0.001
IIP (socially inhibited)
9.29±5.98
6.67±5.76
17.46±5.69
14.68±6.78
p<0.001
IIP (nonassertive)
6.70±3.17
7.89±5.91
17.40±5.76
17.44±6.42
p<0.001
IIP (overly accomodating)
9.47±5.36
9.85±5.10
14.73±7.24
14.92±6.48
p<0.001
IIP (self-sacrificing)
13.11±5.58
12.10±4.26
15.73±5.43
16.96±5.36
p=0.002
IIP (intrusive/needy)
8.64±4.79
7.89±4.84
9.66±5.76
10.64±5.20
p=0.104 NS
Values are given as mean ± standard deviation; BDI, Beck Depression Inventory; RSES, Rosenberg Scale; SSES, State Self-
esteem Scale; AF5, Self-Concept Form 5; PANAS, Possitive Affect Negative Affect Scale; LSAS, Liebowitz Social Anxiety
Scale; STAI, State-Trait Anxiety Inventory for Adults; IIP, Inventory of Interpersonal Problems; p-values refer to the
significance level of the effect of self-esteem; NS, no significant difference between low and high self-esteem.
Table 2 Emotional and behavioral responses to the Ultimatum Game.
High Self-esteem (n=45)
Low Self-esteem
(n=40)
Men
Women
Men
Women
Emotional responses to fair offers
Happiness
5.05±2.04
5.13±1.84
4.42±1.74
5.68±1.88
Anger
0.33±0.55
0.22±0.36
0.82±0.86
0.15±0.20
Sadness
0.30±0.66
0.12±0.23
0.45±0.52
0.22±0.50
Betrayed
0.32±0.53
0.25±0.55
0.64±0.79
0.42±1.07
Emotional responses to medium offers
Happiness
1.81±1.84
2.06±1.46
1.68±1.17
2.19±1.04
Anger
2.10±1.92
1.41±1.45
2.19±1.45
1.97±1.22
Sadness
1.28±1.57
0.79±1.20
0.90±0.99
1.45±1.64
Betrayed
2.11±2.03
1.57±2.03
1.69±1.38
1.73±1.95
Emotional responses to unfair offers
Happiness
0.67±1.13
0.65±1.13
1.32±1.94
0.49±1.60
Anger
3.99±2.88
2.95±2.50
3.73±2.47
4.73±2.55
Sadness
2.29±2.57
1.52±2.26
1.40±1.66
3.06±2.85
Betrayed
3.57±3.18
2.98±2.96
2.76±2.24
4.01±3.12
Emotional responses related to meeting again with the co-
players
Happiness
4.12±2.18
4.17±1.83
3.64±1.65
3.61±1.85
Anger
1.53±2.24
0.65±1.50
0.79±1.12
1.56±2.12
Sadness
0.76±1.52
0.09±0.29
0.50±1.40
0.94±1.51
Anxiety
1.53±1.66
1.87±1.87
2.71±2.23
3.06±2.15
Ratio of offers proposed to the co-players (amount of
money offered to the responder/total amount of money)
0.48±0.03
0.47±0.03
0.47±0.04
0.46±0.04
Rejection rates
Fair offers
3.12±3.76
1.13±2.62
1.93±2.02
0.58±0.90
Medium offers
15.47±5.22
14.04±4.79
15.93±2.59
13.42±3.50
Unfair offers
19.58±1.06
18.78±2.80
19.21±0.89
19.32±1.20
Reaction times (in seconds)
Fair offers
2.01±0.33
1.91±0.34
2.07±0.49
2.00±0.26
Medium offers
2.21±0.52
2.24±0.51
2.35±0.55
2.51±0.56
Unfair offers
1.99±0.52
1.96±0.53
1.92±0.46
2.02±0.29
Values are given as mean ± standard deviation.
Highlights
The effect of self-esteem during the Ultimatum Game was investigated.
Low self-esteem people experience a high distress by interpersonal problems.
Self-esteem modulates anger response to unfair offers in women.
