Scandinavian Working Papers in Economics

Working Papers in Economics,
University of Bergen, Department of Economics

No 06/13: Incentives and creativity in groups

Joachim Ramm, Sigve Tjøtta () and Gaute Torsvik ()
Additional contact information
Joachim Ramm: Minestry of Local Governmenet and Regional Development
Sigve Tjøtta: University of Bergen
Gaute Torsvik: University of Bergen

Abstract: It has been argued that monetary incentives restrain individual creativity and hamper performance in jobs requiring out of the box thinking. This paper reports from an experiment designed to test if the negative incentive effect is present also when individuals work together to solve such problems. We do not find a negative impact of incentives on group performance. As a comparison we ran the same experiment (the Candle Problem) with and without incentives for individuals as well. Incentives did not reduce performance there either. Comparing individuals with groups we find that team-work facilitates creative problems solving. Individuals appear to be more creative when working together than when working alone.

Keywords: Incentives; innovation; creativity

JEL-codes: J24; J31; M11; O31

17 pages, June 1, 2013

Full text files 

wp%206.13.pdf PDF-file Full text

Download statistics

Questions (including download problems) about the papers in this series should be directed to Kjell Erik Lommerud ()
Report other problems with accessing this service to Sune Karlsson ().

RePEc:hhs:bergec:2013_006This page generated on 2024-10-27 22:37:47.