Cooperation in public goods games increases in the presence of between-group competition. In this study, we validate the effect of between-group competition in a different social dilemma, a resource appropriation game. Unlike the voluntary contributions setting, group performance in this game increases with the exercise of a passive choice: not appropriating units in an open-access resource. We conducted an incentivized experiment using 276 undergraduate students in which groups of four subjects played a resource appropriation game.