%0 Report
        %A Bryson, Alex
%A Dolton, Peter
%A Reade, J. James
%A Schreyer, Dominik
%A Singleton, Carl
        %T Experimental Effects of an Absent Crowd on Performances and Refereeing Decisions during COVID-19
        %D 2020
        %8 2020 Aug
        %I Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)
        %C Bonn
        %7 IZA Discussion Paper
        %N 13578
        %U https://www.iza.org/publications/dp13578
        %X The Covid-19 pandemic has induced worldwide natural experiments on the effects of crowds. We exploit one of these experiments currently taking place over several countries in almost identical settings: professional football matches played behind closed doors. We find large and statistically significant effects on the number of yellow cards issued by referees. Without a crowd, fewer cards were awarded to the away teams, reducing home advantage. These results have implications for the influence of social pressure and crowds on the neutrality of refereeing decisions.
        %K referee bias
%K natural experiments
%K home advantage
%K COVID-19
%K Coronavirus
%K attendance
%K social pressure