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Dissociable Effects of Monetary, Liquid, and Social Incentives on Motivation and Cognitive Control
Journal article   Open access   Peer reviewed

Dissociable Effects of Monetary, Liquid, and Social Incentives on Motivation and Cognitive Control

Jennifer L. Crawford, Debbie M. Yee, Haijing W. Hallenbeck, Ashton Naumann, Katherine Shapiro, Renee J. Thompson and Todd S. Braver
Frontiers in psychology, Vol.11, p.2212
09/09/2020
DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2020.02212
PMID: 33013575
url
https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.02212View
Published (Version of record) Open Access

Abstract

Humans are social creatures and, as such, can be motivated by aspects of social life (e.g., approval from others) to guide decision-making in everyday contexts. Indeed, a common view is that people may have stronger orientation toward social goals or incentives relative to other incentive modalities, such as food or money. However, current studies have only rarely addressed how social incentives compare to other types of rewards in motivating goal-directed behavior. The current study tested this claim; across two separate experiments, the effects of liquid and social incentives were compared in terms of their subsequent impact on task performance and self-reported affect and motivation. Critically, valenced social incentives offered both ecological validity (short video clips-Experiment 1) and continuity with prior stimuli used in the social reward and motivation literature (static images-Experiment 2) when examining their effect on behavior. Across both studies, the results replicate and extend prior work, demonstrating robust effects of liquid incentives on task performance and self-reported affect and motivation, while also supporting an interpretation of weaker motivational and affective effects for social incentives. These patterns of results highlight the complex and wide-ranging effects of social incentives and call into question the effectiveness of social incentives, relative to other incentive modalities, in motivating behavior.
Psychology Psychology, Multidisciplinary Social Sciences

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