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Mutual monitoring, approval motivation and fostering cooperation in teams

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2025

Jonathan Levy Open the ORCID record for Jonathan Levy [Opens in a new window]
Jonathan Levy*
Affiliation:
Department of Economics, Monash University, Wellington Rd, Clayton, VIC 3800, Australia
*
e-mail: jonathan.levy@monash.edu
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Abstract

We establish whether the efficacy of mutual monitoring in fostering cooperation is dependent on the degree of approval motivation within teams. Approval motivation is defined as the desire to produce positive perceptions in others and the incentive to acquire the approval of others as well as the desire to avoid disapproval, (Martin in J Personality Assess 48(5):508–519, 1984). Contrary to the theoretical predictions, the results from the experiment suggest that mutual monitoring was not effective in fostering cooperation in teams. Furthermore, the efficacy of mutual monitoring in fostering cooperation was not correlated with the degree of approval motivation within teams.

Keywords

CooperationPublic goodApproval motivationSocial normsExperiments

JEL classification

A13: Relation of Economics to Social Values H41: Public Goods D11: Consumer Economics: Theory C91: Laboratory, Individual Behavior
Type
Original Paper
Information
Journal of the Economic Science Association , Volume 7 , Issue 1 , September 2021 , pp. 74 - 87
Copyright
Copyright © 2021 Crown

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Footnotes

I am indebted to Jingjing Zhang, John Wooders, Philip Grossman and Lata Gangadharan for invaluable advice and encouragement. I would like to thank Matt Van Essen, Toru Suzuki, Antonio Rosato, Gordon Menzies, Gigi Foster, Maros̆ Servátka, Daniel Zizzo, Lyla Zhang, Changzia Ke, Nina Xue and Aleksei Chernulich for comments and discussion. I would also like to thank the editors and anonymous referees for useful suggestions and comments. I am grateful for financial support from the Department of Economics at Monash University.

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