The DOI matches its Crossref record; 12 of the 12 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
When and Why Incentives (Don't) Work to Modify Behavior
Open accessAbstract
First we discuss how extrinsic incentives may come into conflict with other motivations. For example, monetary incentives from principals may change how tasks are perceived by agents, with negative effects on behavior. In other cases, incentives might have the desired effects in the short term, but they still weaken intrinsic motivations. To put it in concrete terms, an incentive for a child to learn to read might achieve that goal in the short term, but then be counterproductive as an incentive for students to enjoy reading and seek it out over their lifetimes. Next we examine the research literature on three important examples in which monetary incentives have been used in a nonemployment context to foster the desired behavior: education; increasing contributions to public goods; and helping people change their lifestyles, particularly with regard to smoking and exercise. The conclusion sums up some lessons on when extrinsic incentives are more or less likely to alter such behaviors in the desired directions.
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Cites
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A Randomized, Controlled Trial of Financial Incentives for Smoking Cessation
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A Randomized Controlled Trial of Financial Incentives for Smoking Cessation
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Increasing Vaccination: Putting Psychological Science Into Action
Brewer, N. T., Chapman, G. B., Rothman, A. J., Leask, J., & Kempe, A. (2017) · Psychological Science in the Public Interest · doi:10.1177/1529100618760521 · Cited by 1,233
Kraft, M. A., Blazar, D., & Hogan, D. (2018) · Review of Educational Research · doi:10.3102/0034654318759268 · Cited by 1,202
Chater, N., & Loewenstein, G. (2023) · Behavioral and Brain Sciences · doi:10.1017/s0140525x22002023 · Cited by 710
Metadata
- Authors
- Gneezy, U., Meier, S., & Rey-Biel, P.
- Venue
- Journal of Economic Perspectives
- Publisher
- American Economic Association
- Published
- 2011-11-01
- Volume
- 25
- Issue
- 4
- Pages
- 191-210
- ISSN
- 0895-3309 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2146868725
- Cited by
- 1,735
- References
- 12
- FWCI
- 129.74
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
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Contains information from the Semantic Scholar Academic Graph Datasets, made available under the ODC Attribution License (ODC-BY 1.0).
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