Punished by Rewards

        The idea that something put in place to motivate us undermines the process it was trying to reinforce in the first place is a hard concept to shallow. This is exactly what Alfie Kohn discusses in his article “Punished by Rewards,” revealing the contradiction that rewards will improve performance, as well as breaking down the negative effects of them. His analysis shows rewards do not motivate people to work harder, rupture relationships, discourage risk taking, lower interests, and become the same as punishments.

         Kohn suggests that rewards can only create temporary obedience and not a change in overall performance, not being able to change the attitude that supports the behavior. Although studies show cutting a salary de-motivates, increasing someone’s salary does not have the opposite effect. According to Kohn, punishments and rewards are two sides to the same coin; the idea of controlling behavior in order to produce a certain outcome is the root to both concepts. By making an outcome based on a certain behavior, the experience of being controlled has a disciplinary quality, as well as expecting a reward and not receiving it by either means of it not working out or withholding this can feel the same as a punishment. Rewards change the relationship we have with people, causing us to compete with others in order to claim the most for ourselves, while also changing the relationship we have with the one’s giving the reward. It also compels people to use rewards as a way of ignoring reasons for behavior, creating a temporary bypass to achieve an ideal condition without having to deal with the problem, while causing the one looking to receive the reward to focus on the goal, rather than looking to achieve any personal opportunities for growth and accomplishment.

        Personally, I agree with Kohn's understanding of using a reward to swing a result in behavior, but I disagree with the severity of negative effects Kohn places on this reward. When it comes down to the analysis of this topic, the idea can really change based on the persons view point, either the one giving or receiving the reward. I feel reward or not, as people, we would not look to do anything if we didn't expect a result from it. Good or bad, the outcome is what we want, and in today's world a reward is only a placeholder for this result. The problem Kohn addresses but doesn't single out, is the idea that today we have too many alternative situations to really care about (or finding) that ideal behavior, and the reward, is only used now, to better highlight the end of the road, so that we may find the choice to follow through with the behavior.