Effect of Monetary Reward on Subsequent Motivation

Summary

Most past research suggests that monetary rewards usually lead to a decrease in intrinsic motivation for a task. Many studies which found this, however, had major methodological problems; e.g., the initial “intrinsically interesting task” might not have been very interesting, the assessment of the dependent variable might have been too restricted. This study tried to remedy some of these. Thirty female undergraduates from a university on the east coast of North Carolina served as Ss. The task involved a biofeedback experiment in which each could learn about the electrical activity of her own brain. All Ss were true volunteers; they were randomly assigned to receive $5, $2, or no money. At the conclusion of the experiment they were asked to volunteer for another session with no opportunity of receiving any monetary reward. Results supported the hypothesis that if a task is truly intrinsically motivating then extrinsic rewards have little effect on subsequent motivation.