Suchergebnisse

This paper uses data from an attendance award program implemented at one of five industrial laundry plants to show the complex costs of corporate awards previously ignored in the literature. We show that although the attendance award had direct, positive effects on employees who previously had punctuality problems, it also led to strategic gaming behavior centered on the specific eligibility criteria for the award. The award program temporarily changed behavior in award-eligible workers but did not habituate improved attendance. Furthermore, we show that the extrinsic reward from the award program crowded out the internal motivation of those employees who had previously demonstrated excellent attendance, generating worse punctuality during periods of ineligibility. Most novelly, we show that the attendance award program also crowded out internal motivation and performance in tasks not included in the award program. Workers with above average pre-program attendance lost 8% efficiency in daily laundry tasks after the program's introduction. We argue that these motivational spillovers result from the perceived inequity of internally motivated workers' previously unrewarded superior attendance contributions. Our paper suggests that even purely symbolic awards can generate gaming and crowding out costs that may spill over to other important tasks.

This book presents a range of empirical evidence to argue that awards can significantly raise performance, even if they are purely symbolic. It makes the case for reorienting our focus away from the monetary or material dimensions of work and private life towards the symbolic dimensions to celebrate merit and achievement.

Abstract
Recent literature in economics has highlighted that competition and symbolic awards can provide non-monetary incentives. In this paper, we report on a step contest that we carried out at a large Swedish workplace in order to test whether competition for symbolic awards can be used to promote physical exercise. Each individual was equipped with a pedometer and registered the number of steps daily during a four week period. Participants competed both in teams and individually and the winning team and individual received symbolic prizes. To evaluate the effect of the competition, we randomized teams into a control group and two treatment groups. We found that the step contest significantly increased both the fraction of subjects that completed the step contest and the number of steps. The number of steps was about 1,000 steps higher in the main treatment group than in the control group (an increase by about 10 percent). This is a conservative estimate as the dropouts on average walked fewer steps than individuals completing the study. In an additional treatment, we also included a daily step goal in the contest. The step goal had no additional significant effect on the number of steps, which may be due to the relatively low step goal used (7,000 steps per day).

Legal systems differ markedly on how they treat the emotional harm suffered by close family members of crime or accident victims. This paper reports the results of two empirical studies examining how citizens whose child, partner, or parent was killed or seriously injured as a result of violent crime or tort (secondary victims) perceive a monetary award for their own non-economic harm relating to the death or injury of their loved one. The objective of our research was to test the Dutch legislator's assumption that a (modest) monetary award for secondary victims' emotional harm can have a meaningful symbolic value by providing recognition and satisfaction. Until then, no compensation was available for such harm under Dutch law. In addition, we examined whether victims' relatives preferred standardization or individuation in determining the amount of the award, how they evaluated the amount, and the manner in which such awards might be offered. In a first quantitative survey study conducted in the Netherlands, 726 secondary victims were asked for their evaluations of such awards for the emotional harm they suffered as a result of the death or injury of their family member. We also asked our representative sample about their actual experience of the legal process in order to put their evaluations of such awards into context. In a second qualitative study, conducted in Belgium, interviews were held with 14 secondary victims who had actually received an award for their own emotional harm under Belgian law (study 2). Results suggest that secondary victims regard an award for emotional harm as a positive gesture and may interpret it as helping to satisfy relatives' psychological concerns by seeing it, for example, as an acknowledgment of loss and responsibility. Overall findings suggest that victims' relatives may be seeking acknowledgement of their emotional losses and the norm violation. © 2011 The Author(s).

Legal systems differ markedly on how they treat the emotional harm suffered by close family members of crime or accident victims. This paper reports the results of two empirical studies examining how citizens whose child, partner, or parent was killed or seriously injured as a result of violent crime or tort (secondary victims) perceive a monetary award for their own non-economic harm relating to the death or injury of their loved one. The objective of our research was to test the Dutch legislator's assumption that a (modest) monetary award for secondary victims' emotional harm can have a meaningful symbolic value by providing recognition and satisfaction. Until then, no compensation was available for such harm under Dutch law. In addition, we examined whether victims' relatives preferred standardization or individuation in determining the amount of the award, how they evaluated the amount, and the manner in which such awards might be offered. In a first quantitative survey study conducted in the Netherlands, 726 secondary victims were asked for their evaluations of such awards for the emotional harm they suffered as a result of the death or injury of their family member. We also asked our representative sample about their actual experience of the legal process in order to put their evaluations of such awards into context. In a second qualitative study, conducted in Belgium, interviews were held with 14 secondary victims who had actually received an award for their own emotional harm under Belgian law (study 2). Results suggest that secondary victims regard an award for emotional harm as a positive gesture and may interpret it as helping to satisfy relatives' psychological concerns by seeing it, for example, as an acknowledgment of loss and responsibility. Overall findings suggest that victims' relatives may be seeking acknowledgement of their emotional losses and the norm violation.

Today's complex film world seems to upset the dual structure corresponding with Bourdieu's categorization of 'restricted' and 'large-scale' fields of cultural production. This article examines how movies in French, Dutch, American and British film fields are classified in terms of material practices and symbolic affordances. It explores how popular, professional, and critical recognition are related to film production as well as interpretation. Analysis of the most successful film titles of 2007 offers insight into the film field's differentiation. Distinction between mainstream and artistic film shows a gradual rather than a dichotomous positioning that spans between conventionality and innovation. Apparently, the intertwining of small-scale and large-scale film fields cannot be perceived as a straightforward loss of distinction or an overall shift of production logics, but rather as 'production on the boundaries' in which filmmakers combine production logics to cater to publics with various levels of aesthetic fluency and omnivorous taste patterns.

В статье рассматривается история наградной системы в России как отражение национальных и геополитических потрясений. Особая символическая роль наградного материала и понимание награды как семейной реликвии привело к тому, что ордена и медали даже периода зарождения российской наградной системы дошли до наших дней в достаточном количестве и широко представлены в музеях. Наградная система может проиллюстрировать международные отношения XVIII-XXI веков. Военные конфликты различных уровней, как глобальные, так и локальные, порождают награды, в том числе и у непризнанных государств (Южная Осетия, Приднестровье, Нагорный Карабах и другие). Многие ордена учреждаются именно в военное время. Наградная система может рассматриваться не только как часть системы государственного поощрения и наказания населения, но и как символ глобальных государственных потрясений. ; The article discusses the history of the award system in Russia as a reflection of national and geopolitical turmoil. A special symbolic role of a premium material and understanding the rewards as family heirlooms led to the fact that the medals even period of origin of the Russian award system have survived in sufficient quantity and is widely represented in museums. Award system can illustrate the international relations of the XVIII-XXI centuries. Military conflicts at various levels, both global and local produce awards, including the unrecognized States (South Ossetia, Pridnestroviye, Nagorny Karabakh, etc.). Many orders are instituted in time of war. Award system can be considered not only as part of a system of state rewards and punishments of the population, but also as a symbol of the global state turmoil.