March 2025 // The Psychology of Decision-Making
We often assume that rewards and punishments work as opposite forces—one encourages behaviour, the other discourages it. However, a study by Kubanek et al. (2015) reveals that our brains handle them in completely different ways.
The Experiment: Testing Decision-Making
Researchers asked participants to make choices in a simple task where they could either gain or lose money. The goal was to see how past experiences of winning or losing influenced their future decisions.
Rewards Encourage Repetition
The study found that when people received a reward, they were more likely to repeat the same choice in the next round. Even more interestingly, the larger the reward, the stronger their tendency to stick with the same decision.
Punishments Trigger Immediate Avoidance
However, punishments had a very different effect. People avoided repeating choices that had led to a loss, but—surprisingly—the size of the penalty didn’t make a difference. Whether they lost a small or large amount, their reaction was the same: they simply avoided the previous choice.
A Challenge to Traditional Thinking
Psychologists have long treated rewards and punishments as equal and opposite forces. This study suggests otherwise. It indicates that our brains have evolved separate systems for processing positive and negative outcomes, rather than treating them as two ends of the same spectrum.
Why This Matters
These insights could have big implications for everything from workplace motivation to education and therapy. If rewards have a more flexible and scalable effect than punishments, then reinforcing good behaviour may be far more effective than punishing bad behaviour.
So, if you want to change behaviour—whether your own or someone else’s—focusing on rewards could be the smartest approach!
Kubanek, J., Snyder, L. H., & Abrams, R. A. (2015). Reward and punishment act as distinct factors in guiding behaviour. Cognition, 139, 154–167. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2015.03.005 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bbi.2020.07.015