illusion of control by proxy

The data investigates the illusion of control by proxy in games of chance - an attempt to exert control by assigning it to others who are perceived as more capable, or luckier. Following up on research by Wohl & Enzle, who showed participants’ preference to ask lucky others to play a lottery instead of doing it themselves, we included proxies with positive and negative qualities in the agency and communion, as well good and bad luck. In three experiments (total N = 249) we tested participants’ choices between proxies and a random number generator in a task consisting of obtaining lottery numbers.