Do norms on contribution behavior affect intrinsic motivation? 
Field-experimental evidence from Germany

Boyer, Pierre; Dwenger, Nadja; Rincke, Johannes

doi:10.1016/j.jpubeco.2016.10.003

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Do norms on contribution behavior affect intrinsic motivation? Field-experimental evidence from Germany

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Dwenger, Nadja
Public Economics, MPI for Tax Law and Public Finance, Max Planck Society;

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Boyer, P., Dwenger, N., & Rincke, J. (2016). Do norms on contribution behavior affect intrinsic motivation? Field-experimental evidence from Germany. Journal of Public Economics, 144, 140-153. doi:10.1016/j.jpubeco.2016.10.003.

Cite as: https://hdl.handle.net/21.11116/0000-0000-2B82-D

Abstract

This paper studies how imposing norms on contribution behavior affects individuals' intrinsic motivation. We consider the church levy, which the Catholic Church in Germany collects as a charitable donation, despite the fact that the levy is legally a tax. We design a randomized field experiment with treatments informing individuals that the levy is a tax. We demonstrate that treatment effects differ across motivational types. Among weakly intrinsically motivated individuals, communicating the legal norm results in a significant crowd-out of intrinsic motivation. In contrast, strongly intrinsically motivated individuals do not show any treatment response.