Abstract

This study examined the effects of different percentages of incentive pay on the performance of a simulated work task when the opportunities for off-task behaviors were available. The independent variable was the percentage of incentive pay. Three percentages of incentive pay were examined: 0%, 10%, and 100%. An alternating treatment design was adopted. The three experimental conditions were randomly alternated for each participant, each experimental condition being administered ten times for the whole experiment. Participants were 4 college students. Participants performed a simulated work task on the computer that consisted of computer-related activities such as dragging, clicking, and typing. The dependent variables were the number of correctly completed work tasks and the amount of idle time (time spent for engaging in off-task behaviors). The results indicated that the performance under the 100% incentive condition was higher than that under the 0% and 10% conditions. However, performance under the 0% and 10% conditions did not differ. Also, the amount of idle time under the 100% condition was lower than that under the 0% and 10% condition, while the amount of idle time under the 0% and 10% conditions did not differ. In addition, it was revealed that performance was significantly correlated with the amount of idle time. The results suggest that more realistic simulation is necessary to examine the effects of different percentages of incentive on work performance.