Incentives

An incentive is a force motivating certain activity. As a key for understanding (and manipulating) human decision-making, the study of incentives is deeply tied to economics and management. Concerning both competitive and cooperative organizational forms, incentives may be financial (material gain), moral (related to social-self apprehension), coercive (punishment), or innate (curiosity, pleasure). [1] More simply, incentives fall into extrinsic (fiscal and/or cultural capital) or intrinsic (psychological) categories, where often a combination of the two forces is at work in decision-making.