Awards Unbundled: Evidence from a Natural Field Experiment

Nava Ashraf, Oriana Bandiera and Scott Lee

STICERD - Economic Organisation and Public Policy Discussion Papers Series from Suntory and Toyota International Centres for Economics and Related Disciplines, LSE

Abstract: Organizations often use awards to incentivize performance. We design a field experiment to unbundle the mechanisms through which awards may affect behavior: by facilitating social comparison and by conferring recognition and visibility. In a nationwide health worker training program in Zambia, employer recognition and social visibility increase performance while social comparison reduces it, especially for low-ability trainees. These effects appear when treatments are announced and persist through training. The findings are consistent with a model of optimal expectations in which low-ability individuals exert low effort in order to avoid information about their relative ability.

Keywords: awards; social comparison; optimal expectations; incentives (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D83 D84 J33 M52 O15 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013-07
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7)

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Related works:
Journal Article: Awards unbundled: Evidence from a natural field experiment (2014)
Working Paper: Awards unbundled: evidence from a natural field experiment (2014)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cep:stieop:046

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