When the Meaning of Work Has Disappeared: Experimental Evidence on Employees’ Performance and Emotions
通过一个自然实验，研究告知员工已完成工作无意义如何降低其后续努力，并发现提供替代意义能完全抵消这种负面效应，同时个体特征如互惠倾向和信任会影响反应。
This experiment tests for a causal relationship between the meaning of work and employees’ motivation to perform well. The study builds on an existing employer–employee relationship, adding realism to the ongoing research of task meaning. Owing to an unexpected project cancelation, we are able to study how varying the information provided about the meaning of previously conducted work—without the use of deception, but still maintaining a high level of control—affects subsequent performance. We observe a strong decline in exerted effort when we inform workers about the meaninglessness of a job already done. Our data also suggests that providing a supplemental alternative meaning perfectly compensates for this negative performance effect. Individual characteristics such as reciprocal inclinations and trust prompt different reactions. The data also show that the meaning of work affects workers’ emotions, but we cannot establish a clear relationship between emotional responses and performance. Data, as supplemental material, are available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.2016.2426 . This paper was accepted by John List, behavioral economics.