集体行动中赏罚效果的差异性研究：来自公共品实验的证据

借助公共品博弈实验来比较奖励和惩罚这两种“选择性激励”的引入对提升公共品自愿捐献的效果。结果显示,被试对奖励的使用更频繁,但是引入惩罚的合作效果更佳,而且这种效果差异还会因为激励引入顺序的差异而加强。通过定量比较这两种激励发挥作用的路径以及行动者使用赏罚的方式,识别出了这种差异存在的行为根源。行动者对奖励的偏好主要源于他们就奖励本身形成的一种互惠,与合作无关;而惩罚效果更强则是因为行动者在使用赏罚时展现出另一层偏好,即相比奖励合作者,行动者更倾向于惩罚不合作者。借助于这种与合作之间更紧密的关系,惩罚获得了相对于奖励而言更强的激励效果,从而可以更有效地提升合作水平。这些结果表明集体行动中赏罚机制的设计需要考虑以下内容:行动者使用赏罚的方式及其行为对象的反应、如何在激励与合作之间建立起直接的联系以及激励引入的时机。

Research on the Difference of the Effects of Reward and Punishment in Collective Action:Evidence from Public Goods Experiment

This article compares the effects of“selective incentives”,namely,reward and punishment,on promoting cooperation by public goods experiments.The results show that although reward is used more frequently than punishment,punishment is more effective than reward in promoting cooperation.Further investigations on how punishment or reward works and how punishment or reward is used suggest that subjects used reward more frequently than punishment just because they formed reciprocity on the reward itself,while punishment is more effective than reward because subjects preferred to punish the free rider rather than the reward cooperator.These results indicate that the relationship between punishment and cooperation is closer than that between reward and cooperation.Decision makers should take these behavioral modes into consideration when designing incentive programs in collective action.