Motivating Students by Using Small Incentives

During a teacher-training workshop I attended years ago, we discussed ways to motivate students to attend class and study for our classes. Some of the suggestions teachers shared were making attendance mandatory and penalizing students for absences, making lectures and classroom activities engaging so students want to attend, and administering pop quizzes. A common theme shared by us all was that the challenge was not easy to accomplish. The discussion turned to the array of activities and responsibilities in the lives of our students other than schoolwork. Students may have work, family, social, and other personal responsibilities they must balance with their schoolwork. Still though, as teachers we know that increasing students' involvement in our courses is important, and there is an abundance of research supporting a positive association between attendance and course performance.

As teachers, we cannot control many aspects of our students' lives, but we can control one powerful variable—their course grade. Research has shown classroom procedures that have grade-related contingencies are effective in increasing student attendance. One type of procedure that is especially effective is the use of pop quizzes, which are unannounced and randomly administered. Pop quizzes are an application of intermittent reinforcement, which means that a student's studying is reinforced only some of the time by the administration of a pop quiz. Intermittent reinforcement motivates students to study and attend class regularly because they don't know when their attendance or studying will produce a payoff.

Much research has found that the use of unannounced quizzes, which account only for a small portion of a students' course grade, are associated with increased attendance and study behavior. Given that grade-related contingencies are an effective way to increase attendance and study behavior, isn't it reasonable to assume that the bigger the grade-related contingency, the greater the influence on attendance and study behavior?

In my research, published in the official journal of the Society for the Teaching of Psychology (Division 2 of the American Psychological Association), I set out to test this assumption in the courses I was teaching. The purpose of my study was to compare the influence of infrequent and minimal-weight unannounced quizzes to a heavily weighted cumulative exam on students' self-reported motivation to attend class and keep up with the assigned class material. Together, the six quizzes throughout the 15-week semester totaled only 3% of the course grade, whereas, the cumulative exam was worth 20% of the course grade. Results indicate that the use of infrequent and minimal-weight quizzes have a stronger influence on self-reported motivation for attendance and study behavior than a heavily weighted cumulative exam.

Although past research has supported the use of unannounced quizzes to improve attendance and study behavior, the distinction in my research was that fewer quizzes totaling fewer course points were used than in past research. Yet, the results were as strong as ever. Contrary to logical assumption, bigger grade-related contingencies do not necessarily have a greater influence on attendance and study behavior. As teachers, we should never underestimate the strength of small incentives.

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Adapted from "Kouyoumdjian, H. (2004). Influence of unannounced quizzes and cumulative exam on attendance and study behavior. Teaching of Psychology, 31(2), 110-111.