Incentives and group identity

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Masella, Paolo; Meier, Stephan; Zahn, Philipp
• 署名单位: University of Sussex; Columbia University; University of Mannheim
• 刊物名称: GAMES AND ECONOMIC BEHAVIOR
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0899-8256
• DOI: 10.1016/j.geb.2014.02.013
• 发表日期: 2014
• 页码: 12-25
• 关键词: Social identity; social preferences; incentives; motivation; Crowding out; trust; experiment

摘要

This paper investigates in a principal agent environment whether and how group membership influences the effectiveness of incentives and when incentives can have hidden costs, i.e., a detrimental effect. We show experimentally that in all interactions control mechanisms can have hidden costs for reasons specific to group membership. In within-group interactions control has detrimental effects because the agent does not expect to be controlled and reacts negatively when being controlled. In between-group interactions, agents perceive control more hostile once we condition on their beliefs about principals' behavior. Our finding contributes to the micro-foundation of psychological effects of incentives. (C) 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.