Abstract
When individuals freely engage in an activity for its own sake, their behavior is considered intrinsically motivated. In reality, however, very few behaviors occur in a social vacuum. Most people eventually encounter external constraints on their behavior, and these constraints can interfere with intrinsic motivation (Lepper, Greene, & Nisbett, 1973). A common constraint is the external evaluation of performance at an activity—task performance is constantly evaluated in educational, athletic, and professional domains. When teachers, coaches, and supervisors evaluate performance on an interesting and involving activity, their evaluation represents an extrinsic intrusion into what had been an intrinsically motivated activity, and may undermine subsequent intrinsic motivation. The effects of performance evaluation on intrinsic motivation depend on the properties of the evaluative situation, and on characteristics of the individual whose performance is evaluated.
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Harackiewicz, J.M. (1989). Performance Evaluation and Intrinsic Motivation Processes: The Effects of Achievement Orientation and Rewards. In: Buss, D.M., Cantor, N. (eds) Personality Psychology. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4684-0634-4_9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4684-0634-4_9
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