A burgeoning literature in experimental studies of the Voluntary Contribution Mechanism focuses on the ability of institutions that allow the monitoring, sanctioning, and/or rewarding of others to facilitate cooperation. In this paper rewards and sanctions are examined in a one-shot VCM setting that so far has been unexplored in the literature. The study finds that while some subjects are willing to reward and sanction others at a personal cost, the opportunity to reward or sanction is ineffective in facilitating cooperation relative to previous experiments in which a repeated game environment is employed. The study also compares behavior in an environment in which the imposition of rewards and sanctions is certain to an environment in which imposition is uncertain. The expected value of the reward or sanction is kept constant across environments to focus simply on the effect of uncertainty about imposition. Uncertainty does not change behavior in a significant way, either in the level of cooperation or the willingness of individuals to impose rewards or sanctions.

We study the effectiveness of costly rewards in mitigating excess extraction in a standard Common Pool Resource (CPR) game experiment. We implement two treatments. In the first, rewards are a pure transfer from one player to the other. In the second, the benefits of receiving a reward are higher than the cost of providing it. Referring to the latter as “net positive” rewards, we observe that these are used more frequently than transfer rewards, and that, unlike transfer rewards, they are effective in sustaining cooperation in the CPR game.

We study the effects on performance of incentives framed as gains or losses, as well as the effort channels through which individuals increase performance. We also explore potential spill-over effects on a non-incentivised activity. Subjects participated in a medically framed real-effort task under one of the three contracts, varying the type of performance incentive received: (1) no incentive; (2) incentive framed as a gain; or (3) incentive framed as a loss. We find that performance improved similarly with incentives framed as losses or gains. However, individuals increase performance differently under the two frames: potential losses increase participants’ performance through a greater attention (fewer mistakes), while bonuses increase the time spent on the rewarded activity. There is no spill-over effect, either negative or positive, on the non-incentivised activity. We discuss the meaning and implications of our results for the design of performance contracts.

In two letters, Pliny and Trajan discuss a petition sent to the governor by the guild of athletes concerning their rewards after winning contests (Plin. Ep. 10.118–19). In his request, Pliny refers to a regulation by which Trajan had settled the rights of the victorious athletes in regard to their home cities. In his response, Trajan repeats the case with slight variations. The two letters pose both philological and historical difficulties, which this article aims to solve. The relevant passage in Trajan's letter is corrupt. As scholarship has misunderstood the historical background of the letters, no satisfying solution for the restoration of the text has been found to date. The argumentation of this article is twofold. First, it offers a new reading of the corrupt passage in the emperor's letter which respects both the textual transmission and the historical situation. Second, it is argued that the two letters refer to a Trajanic law which settled the regulations of iselastic contests for the first time, but left some details undecided. In sum, this article proposes a new reading of a damaged passage in Plin. Ep. 10.119 as well as offering a historical commentary on agonistic activities in imperial Asia Minor.

The Welfare of Farmed Animals (England) Regulations (2007) make it an offence to allow unnecessary suffering to animals, highlighting that farmers have a duty of care for their livestock. Despite this, the current global mean prevalence of lameness in sheep in England is 5%; ie ~750,000 lame adult sheep at any time. To investigate farmers’ attitudes to sanctions and rewards as drivers to reduce the prevalence of lameness in sheep, farmers’ attitudes to external inspections, acceptable prevalence of lameness and attitudes on outcomes from inspections were investigated using a self-administered questionnaire. A total of 43/102 convenience-selected English sheep farmers responded to the questionnaire. Their median flock size was 500 ewes with a geometric mean prevalence of lameness of 2.8%. Few farmers selected correct descriptions of the legislation for treatment and transport of lame sheep. Participants considered 5-7.5% prevalence of lameness acceptable and were least tolerant of farmers who rarely treated lameness and most tolerant of farmers experiencing an incident out of their control, eg disease outbreak. Participants consider sanctions and rewards would help to control lameness on sheep farms in England. Sanctions (prosecution, reduction in payment from the single [basic] payment scheme or suspension from a farm assurance scheme) were considered ‘fair’ when lameness was ≥ 10% and rewards ‘fair’ when lameness was ≤ 2%. If these farmers’ attitudes are applied to 1,300 randomly selected flocks with a mean prevalence of lameness of 3.5%, 24.6% of flocks that had ≥ 10% lameness would be sanctioned and 32.5% of flocks that had ≤ 2% lameness would be rewarded.

Using a stochastic dominance approach in an international dataset of about 10,000 Catholic subjects, we show that incentives (based on absolute belief) play a crucial role in religious practice (church attendance and prayer). Furthermore, we find that when both positive (heaven) and negative (hell) incentives are available, the former have a much stronger effect than the latter. The results are confirmed using Kolmogorov-Smirnov tests.

Departing from a universal perspective on affective organizational commitment, the present article examines the situational and personal variables that act as potential moderators of the relationship between affective commitment and its antecedents and outcomes. Based on emerging evidence and theory, it is argued that the relationship between extrinsic and intrinsic rewards and other job experiences and affective commitment is stronger when employees exert an influence over rewards and job experiences. This can be achieved when the organization offers opportunities for such influence or when employees’ traits help them earn expected rewards. Similarly, theory and empirical evidence suggest that the relationship between affective commitment and work outcomes is subject to moderating influences. For example, affective commitment may foster employee retention when more career opportunities are available, making one’s belongingness to the organization more attractive. Such career opportunities may result from the organization’s action or from individuals’ own proactivity to obtain them. Likewise, the relationship between affective commitment and work performance is likely stronger when supervisors’ leadership helps employees engage in those behaviors that are rewarded by the organization. Finally, we discuss avenues for future inquiry by identifying group-level and cultural variables as promising moderators that warrant attention.

Adolescents’ snack choices could be altered by increasing the reinforcing value (RV) of healthy snacks compared with unhealthy snacks. This study assessed whether the RV of fruit increased by linking it to a reward and if this increased RV was comparable with the RV of unhealthy snacks alone. Moderation effects of sex, hunger, BMI z-scores and sensitivity to reward were also explored. The RV of snacks was assessed in a sample of 165 adolescents (15·1 (sd 1·5) years, 39·4 % boys and 17·4 % overweight) using a computerised food reinforcement task. Adolescents obtained points for snacks through mouse clicks (responses) following progressive ratio schedules of increasing response requirements. Participants were (computer) randomised to three experimental groups (1:1:1): fruit (n 53), fruit+reward (n 60) or unhealthy snacks (n 69). The RV was evaluated as total number of responses and breakpoint (schedule of terminating food reinforcement task). Multilevel regression analyses (total number of responses) and Cox’s proportional hazard regression models (breakpoint) were used. The total number of responses made were not different between fruit+reward and fruit (b −473; 95 % CI −1152, 205, P=0·17) or unhealthy snacks (b410; 95 % CI −222, 1043, P=0·20). The breakpoint was slightly higher for fruit than fruit+reward (HR 1·34; 95 % CI 1·00, 1·79, P=0·050), whereas no difference between unhealthy snacks and fruit+reward (HR 0·86; 95 % CI 0·62, 1·18, P=0·34) was observed. No indication of moderation was found. Offering rewards slightly increases the RV of fruit and may be a promising strategy to increase healthy food choices. Future studies should however, explore if other rewards, could reach larger effect sizes.

This article examines the impact on the patent system of rewards for innovation across the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. During this period, Parliament would regularly grant rewards to inventors, with many of these rewards being set out in legislation. This legislation provided Parliament with the opportunity to promote a model of state support for inventors: a model that made public disclosure of the invention a precondition for assistance. This had important implications for patent law, in particular, in helping to develop the role of the patent specification and the doctrine of sufficiency of disclosure. In this way, the reward system helped establish the framework under which the state would provide support for inventors. Simultaneously, however, the reward system created a space in which inventors would have to do more than meet the minimum requirement of public disclosure. Rewards allowed the state to distinguish between different classes of inventor and to make special provision for particularly worthy individuals. In this way, the reward system recognised the contribution of the “heroic inventor”, whilst leaving the core of the patent system undisturbed.