Exploring the Kohler motivation gain effect: Impression management and spontaneous goal setting

Recent research on the "Kohler effect" (e.g., Hertel, Ken; & Messe, 2000a,b ) has demonstrated that persons increase their effort when working with a s tronger coworker compared to when working as individuals. One pre-condition for these motivation gains was a conjunctive task structure, suggesting th at high instrumentality of the weaker worker's performance for the group ou tcome is crucial for the effect to occur. Two experiments were conducted to replicate and further explore these instrumentality effects using a physic al persistence paradigm. Experiment 1 compared anonymous and non-anonymous teams working conjunctively to test whether collective motives (maximizing group's outcome) or individualistic interests (impression management) are m ore likely to underlie the Kohler motivation gain effect. Results replicate d overall motivation gains and showed only slight effects of the anonymity variation, suggesting that the motivation gains are more a product of colle ctive motives than individualistic interests. In Experiment 2, spontaneous goal setting processes were explored as a possible mediator of the Kohler m otivation gain effect. Comparing conjunctiva and additive task conditions f or weaker group members again demonstrated that high instrumentality is cru cial for the Kohler motivation gain effect. Moreover, while there was no re liable difference between these conditions in reported goal setting, simula ting high instrumentality goals by explicit instruction in another additive task condition did lead to significant motivation gains.