Does monitoring adversely affect worker performance? Evidence from a natural field experiment

Last registered on June 09, 2024
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Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Does monitoring adversely affect worker performance? Evidence from a natural field experiment
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0003475
Initial registration date
October 22, 2018

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published
October 23, 2018, 9:28 PM EDT

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Last updated
June 09, 2024, 7:45 AM EDT

Last updated is the most recent time when changes to the trial's registration were published.

Locations

Country
Switzerland
Region
Country
United States of America
Region

Primary Investigator

Name
Christian Zihlmann
Affiliation
University of Fribourg
Contact Primary Investigator

Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Name
Holger Herz
PI Affiliation
University of Fribourg
Contact Investigator

Additional Trial Information

Status
Completed
Start date
2018-07-04
End date
2023-12-31
Keywords
Firms & Productivity, Labor
Additional Keywords
Monitoring, Hidden Costs of Control, Remote work, Field experiment
JEL code(s)
C93, D21, J24, M5
Secondary IDs
Prior work
This trial does not extend or rely on any prior RCTs.
Abstract
We conduct a natural field experiment with remote workers to assess potential adverse effects of monitoring.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Herz, Holger and Christian Zihlmann. 2024. "Does monitoring adversely affect worker performance? Evidence from a natural field experiment." AEA RCT Registry. June 09. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.3475-8.0
Former Citation
Herz, Holger and Christian Zihlmann. 2024. "Does monitoring adversely affect worker performance? Evidence from a natural field experiment." AEA RCT Registry. June 09. https://www.socialscienceregistry.org/trials/3475/history/223958
Sponsors & Partners
Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
A control device is implemented in a natural work environment. We will investigate how workers react to such an implementation of control: Is there a negative behavioural reaction, i.e. do workers lower their effort once control is implemented?

Two groups:
1. Control group - incomplete contract (no control device)
2. Treatment group - contract with a minimum performance requirement (a imperfect control device)
Intervention (Hidden)
Please refer to the pre-analysis plan, where this is described in further detail.
Intervention Start Date
2018-12-10
Intervention End Date
2020-03-12

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
Primary outcome is how workers performance is affected by the random assignment to the control and treatment group. Hence, key outcome variable is workers performance. For further details, please refer to the pre-analysis plan.
Primary Outcomes (explanation)
For further details, please refer to the pre-analysis plan.

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
For further details, please refer to the pre-analysis plan.
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)
Please refer to the pre-analysis plan.

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
The (public) description of the experimental design is kept to its minimum to avoid experimenter demand effects. The (hidden) description will become public once the study is completed and will help you to understand the design in further detail.

In short, in a real labor market, we create two groups: One group receives an incomplete contract and is not subject no any controlling or monitoring device. The other group receives a more complete contract with a minimum performance requirement as a control device. First, all workers are assigned to an incomplete contract (HIT1). In a second stage, workers are assigned to one of the two mentioned groups (HIT2) and perform again a real-effort task.
Experimental Design Details
For further details, please refer to the pre-analysis plan.
Randomization Method
Randomization done by a computer software (Otree).
Randomization Unit
Individual
Was the treatment clustered?
No

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
no clustered treatment.
Sample size: planned number of observations
For the calculation of power and the planned number of observations, please refer to the pre-analysis plan.
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
For the calculation of power and the planned number of observations, please refer to the pre-analysis plan.
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
For the calculation of power and the planned number of observations, please refer to the pre-analysis plan.
Supporting Documents and Materials

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IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
Internal Review Board of the Department of Psychology, University of Fribourg
IRB Approval Date
2018-07-02
IRB Approval Number
2018-393
Analysis Plan

Analysis Plan Documents

Memo concerning pre-analysis plan 22 Oct 2018 (dated 10 Dec 18)

MD5: 3c2fb1349c446287dcf94d53c636a42f

SHA1: 71f86dd9ed7960194f8a2dd71237db18f8ee939b

Uploaded At: December 10, 2018

Pre-analysis Plan 8 March 2020 - REPLICATION

MD5: 0ed3485ff554301cc506edaa91167cd6

SHA1: a629d2dbbbee05bb833430403ae95cd916f25611

Uploaded At: March 08, 2020

Pre-analysis Plan 22 Oct 2018

MD5: 419fe1daec88d8ece8679a6a8957f2f6

SHA1: d51d043e57bcead7f7cbb3e264f85878dc4af0ad

Uploaded At: October 23, 2018

Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

Study Withdrawal

There is information in this trial unavailable to the public. Use the button below to request access.

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Intervention

Is the intervention completed?
Yes
Intervention Completion Date
March 12, 2020, 12:00 +00:00
Data Collection Complete
Yes
Data Collection Completion Date
March 12, 2020, 12:00 +00:00
Final Sample Size: Number of Clusters (Unit of Randomization)
See paper
Was attrition correlated with treatment status?
No
Final Sample Size: Total Number of Observations
See paper
Final Sample Size (or Number of Clusters) by Treatment Arms
See paper
Data Publication

Data Publication

Is public data available?
Yes
Public Data URL
https://osf.io/r9atb/

Program Files

Program Files
Yes
Program Files URL
https://osf.io/r9atb/
Reports, Papers & Other Materials

Relevant Paper(s)

Abstract
We conduct a field experiment with Amazon Mechanical Turk (“AMT”) workers
to causally assess the effect of introducing a control mechanism in an existing work
relationship on workers’ performance on tasks of varying difficulty. We find that
introducing control significantly reduces performance. This reduction occurs primarily
on challenging tasks, while performance on simple tasks is unaffected. The
negative effects are primarily driven by workers who exhibit non-pecuniary motivation
in the absence of control. Our results show that there are adverse effects of
control, and they suggest that these adverse effects are of particular concern to firms
that rely on high performance on challenging tasks.
Citation
Herz, H., Zihlmann, C. Adverse effects of control? Evidence from a field experiment. Exp Econ (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10683-024-09823-3
URL
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10683-024-09823-3

Reports & Other Materials