Do Rewards Reduce Effort? Evidence from University Exams
(joint with Malte Sandner and Daniel Schnitzlein)
This paper investigates the effect of rewards on the effort levels of college freshmen. In our setting, students could earn bonus points for a final term exam if they passed a mid-term pre-exam. Based on administrative data from university records, we compare students who barely passed their pre-exam to those who barely failed. Our regression discontinuity estimations reveal that bonus points worsen final exam performance of male students, but have no effect on female students. These findings give new insights on how behavior is shaped by both incentives and revealed information about own skill.