Cooperation or Competition? A Field Experiment on Non-monetary Learning Incentives

Abstract: We assess the effect of two antithetic non-monetary incentive schemes based on grading rules on students’ effort, using experimental data. We randomly assigned students to a tournament scheme that fosters competition between paired up students, a cooperative scheme that promotes information sharing and collaboration between students and a baseline treatment in which students can neither compete nor cooperate. In line with theoretical predictions, we find that competition induces higher effort with respect to cooperation, whereas cooperation does not increase effort with respect to the baseline treatment. Nonetheless, we find a strong gender effect since this result holds only for men while women do not react to this type of non-monetary incentives.

Object Details

• Location: Deutsche Nationalbibliothek Frankfurt am Main
• Extent: Online-Ressource
• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Cooperation or Competition? A Field Experiment on Non-monetary Learning Incentives ; volume:15 ; number:4 ; year:2015 ; pages:1753-1792 ; extent:40 ; The B.E. journal of economic analysis & policy ; 15, Heft 4 (2015), 1753-1792 (gesamt 40)

Contributors, Places and Time

• Creator: Bigoni, Maria ; Fort, Margherita ; Nardotto, Mattia ; Reggiani, Tommaso

Further information

• DOI: 10.1515/bejeap-2014-0109
• URN: urn:nbn:de:101:1-2408251609581.627497470382
• Rights: Open Access; Der Zugriff auf das Objekt ist unbeschränkt möglich.
• Last update: 15.08.2025, 7:34 AM CEST