Simple psychology for daily life: The Crespi effect
The Crespi effect is a phenomenon encountered in conditioning. When a desired action is taken and reinforced with positive reinforcement, the quality of the subsequent performance of the action depends on the size of the previous reward to an expectation. Crespi discovered that rats running a maze will increase their speed if the previous reward was great, and slow it if it was meagre.
Examples of where this effect may influence an outcome could be:
- Paying employees in something other than money that is anchored to, but fluctuates from, a monetary value.
- Running out of dog treats and being able to reward a show dog’s training with only one biscuit instead of the usual three the day before the big dog show.
- Rewarding a fighter with an extra helping of food after after weigh-in and a final sparring session.
Moderating rewards in this way can influence the level of effort to expect on the next performance of a task. While it’s generally safe to take full advantage of this effect with young children and animals, you’re likely to encounter resistance from more aware individuals not complicit with what’s being done.
It’s better to use knowledge of this to minimise under-performance than to manipulate for short-term increased performance, particularly as patterns will quickly emerge.
Awareness of the Crespi effect can benefit:
- Employers that pay in unconventional currencies or remuneration.
- Those training animals for performances or competitions.
- Teachers looking to boost a student’s baseline performance.
