How different types of participant payments alter task performance
Journal Title: Judgment and Decision Making - Year 2009, Vol 4, Issue 5
Abstract
Researchers typically use incentives (such as money or course credit) in order to obtain participants who engage in the specific behaviors of interest to the researcher. There is, however, little understanding or agreement on the effects of different types and levels of incentives used. Some results in the domain of statistical reasoning suggest that performance differences — previously deemed theoretically important — may actually be due to differences in incentive types across studies. 704 participants completed one of five variants of a statistical reasoning task, for which they received either course credit, flat fee payment, or performance-based payment incentives. Successful task completion was more frequent with performance-based incentives than with either of the other incentive types. Performance on moderately difficult tasks (compared to very easy and very hard tasks) was most sensitive to incentives. These results can help resolve existing debates about inconsistent findings, guide more accurate comparisons across studies, and be applied beyond research settings.
Authors and Affiliations
Gary L. Brase
Keywords
Related Articles
- EP ID EP677697
- DOI -
- Views 175
- Downloads 0
The multiplicity of emotions: A framework of emotional functions in decision making
A four-fold classification of emotions with respect to their functions in decision making is proposed. It is argued that emotions are not homogenous concerning their role in decision making, but that four distinct functi...
Modeling sequential context effects in judgment analysis:
In this article a broad perspective incorporating elements of time series theory is presented for conceptualizing the data obtained in multi-trial judgment experiments. Recent evidence suggests that sequential context ef...
Amos Tversky's contributions to legal scholarship: Remarks at the BDRM session in honor of Amos Tversky, June 16, 2006
Together with his long-time colleague Daniel Kahneman, Amos Tversky, provided the intellectual infrastructure for contemporary behavioral law and economics. Prospect theory undermines the Coase Theorem, which is the bedr...
It must be awful for them: Perspective and task context affects ratings for health conditions
When survey respondents rate the quality of life (QoL) associated with a health condition, they must not only evaluate the health condition itself, but must also interpret the meaning of the rating scale in order to assi...
Response mode, compatibility, and dual-processes in the evaluation of simple gambles: An eye-tracking investigation
We employed simple gambles to investigate information processing in relation to the compatibility effect. Subjects should be more likely to engage in a deliberative thinking strategy when completing a pricing task rather...