Peers’ Performance Feedback: Evidence from Soccer Penalty Shootouts

This paper examines the role of peers’ performance feedback on individual productivity in competitive environments. We specifically study the link between individual performance and the past performance of teammates and opposing teams. We use a dataset on all the penalty kicks in knockout stages of World Cup and European Cup competitions in male soccer from 1976 to 2024. We find that the probability of scoring a penalty kick is 17.9 percentage points lower after the opponent team scored a kick but does not change with the outcome of a teammate’s penalty kick. Our evidence supports the notion that individuals’ underperformance when feeling pressure (“choking under pressure”) is primarily driven by feedback on competitors’ performance, rather than by teammates’ performance.