I thought that new – and veteran – readers might find it interesting if I began sharing my best posts from over the years. You can see the entire collection here.

 

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In 2012, I wrote a column for the Washington Post about two ridiculous studies on “loss aversion” in schools. It was titled Merit pay and ‘loss aversion:’ Nonsense studies.

It was even worse than treating students as rats in a maze – they gave elementary school children rewards and then took them back if they didn’t score well on their tests.

Here’s an excerpt from an interview with one of the researchers which I reprinted in my column:

Q: The ones that did badly — did you rip it away from them and then did they scream and cry?

A: Yeah, it’s hard when you rip a trophy out of the hands of an eight year old.

I wrote about these studies much more extensively in The Best Posts On “Loss Aversion” & Schools.