Effects of Extrinsic Rewards on Children's Subsequent Intrinsic Interest

GREENE, DAVID, and LEPPER, MARK R. Effects of Extrinsic Rewards on Children's Subsequent Intrinsic Interest. CHILD DEVELOPMENT, 1974, 45, 1141-1145. Preschool children were asked, in individual sessions, to engage in an activity of high initial interest, either for its own sake or in order to obtain an extrinsic reward. Subsequently, children who had undertaken the target activity as a means to some ulterior end showed less intrinsic interest in this activity, as measured unobtrusively several weeks later in the children's classrooms, than control subjects who had either received the same reward unexpectedly or had engaged in the activity without expectation or receipt of extrinsic rewards.