A summary of the effects of reward contingencies on interest and performance.

Abstract

In recent years, the view that rewards disrupt performance and motivation has gained popularity. This claim is primarily based on experiments from social psychological research. To evaluate the validity of this contention, a statistical analysis of more than 140 experiments concerning the effects of rewards on performance and interest was conducted (Cameron, Banko, & Pierce, 2001). The present article is a non-technical summary of this research. Our evaluation of more than thirty years of research indicates there is no inherent negative property of external reward. Careful arrangement of rewards in education, business, and home settings can enhance interest and performance. This occurs when rewards are closely tied to attainment of performance standards and to specific behavioral criteria. ********** In educational settings, teachers use praise, gold stars, access to preferred activities, and an array of incentives to promote leaming. Businesses use pay, recognition, bonuses, or other types of rewards to encourage high levels of performance by their employees. Parents offer children rewards for doing well at school, for accomplishments in sports, and for progressive achievement in the arts. Given that rewards are widely used in everyday settings, it is noteworthy that some researchers and practitioners claim that rewards damage peoples' motivation and performance (e.g., Deci, Koestner & Ryan, 1999; Kohn, 1993). The argument is that individuals experience feelings of competence and self-determination when they enjoy what they are doing (Deci & Ryan, 1985). When offered a reward for performance, the claim is that people do the activity for the incentive rather than for internal reasons. The result is said to be a reduction in perceptions of competence and self-determination that in turn decrease motivation and quality of performance. The view that rewards undermine motivation and performance is popular. As a result, many teachers are reluctant to use a reward system in their classrooms; the concern is that students will lose their motivation to engage in school activities. Our research suggests there is no inherent negative property of external reward (Cameron, Banko, & Pierce, 2001). Our analysis of more than thirty years of research concerning rewards and motivation indicates that rewards can be used effectively to enhance interest and performance. When rewards are tied to meeting attainable performance standards, motivation and performance are maintained or enhanced. Research on rewards, motivation, and performance comes from experimental social psychology. Over the past few years, we conducted a series of analyses of this literature to determine when and under what conditions rewards produce increases or decreases in performance and interest (Cameron et al., 2001; Cameron & Pierce, 1994; Eisenberger & Cameron, 1996). In this article, we describe the experimental literature on this topic and outline how the findings were organized, analyzed, and integrated. We present a summary of our meta-analytic results and discuss the implications of the findings. For a detailed and technical description of our analyses, the reader is referred to our paper in The Behavior Analyst (Cameron et al., 2001). RESEARCH ON REWARDS AND INTRINSIC MOTIVATION The notion that rewards destroy an individual's intrinsic motivation led to a number of experiments. Since the 1970s, more than 140 studies, using a common set of procedures, have been conducted to investigate the alleged undermining effects of reward. In a typical experiment, people are presented with an interesting task (e.g., solving puzzles, drawing pictures, or playing word games) for which they receive praise, money, candy, gold stars and so forth. A control group performs the activity without receiving a reward. Both groups are then observed during a non-reward period in which they are free to continue performing the task or to engage in some alternative activity (free-choice period). …