Increasing Children's Interest through Performance-Contingent Reward

It was hypothesized that rewards made contingent on performance quality would enhance intrinsic motivation, since this type of contingency would provide information about task competence. Children received rewards for successfully (performance-contingent) or simply (task-contingent) completing a series of maze puzzles under conditions that made the reward contingency more or less salient. Subsequent to this manipulation, children were given the opportunity to play with additional maze puzzles or alternative activities during a 5-minute free-choice session, in which they were observed unobtrusively. In general, performance-contingent rewards enhanced children's interest relative to task-contingent rewards and a no-reward control, and these effects were more pronounced when the contingencies were made salient. Sex differences emerged, indicating that performance-contingent rewards were more effective in enhancing the intrinsic motivation of boys. The pattern of data obtained suggests ways in which reward can either facilitate or hinder intrinsic motivation, depending on the reward contingency employed.