Awards as Incentives

Neckermann, Susanne; Frey, Bruno S.

doi:10.2139/ssrn.1021208

Download This Paper

Open PDF in Browser

Add Paper to My Library

Awards as Incentives

Institute for Empirical Research in Economics Working Paper No. 334

38 Pages Posted: 18 Oct 2007 Last revised: 9 Dec 2008

See all articles by Susanne Neckermann

Susanne Neckermann

University of Zurich - Department of Economics

Bruno S. Frey

CREMA; University of Basel

Date Written: November 1, 2008

Abstract

Non-monetary incentives in the form of awards have so far escaped the attention of economists despite their widespread use. This paper presents an experiment conducted online at IBM to assess the impact of these kinds of extrinsic incentives. Introducing a hypothetical award has statistically significant effects on stated contributions to a public good. Our design allows the estimation of the impact of different award characteristics related to, for example, how public or how valuable the award is. We illustrate these findings by providing predictions about the behavior induced by a new award at IBM.

Keywords: incentives, non-monetary compensation, awards, motivation, experiment

JEL Classification: C99, J33, M52

Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation

Neckermann, Susanne and Frey, Bruno S., Awards as Incentives (November 1, 2008). Institute for Empirical Research in Economics Working Paper No. 334, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1021208 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1021208