The study conducted by Ridinger and McBride (2015) dwells on the importance of Theory of Mind (ToM), which is defined as one’s ability to predict behaviors and thoughts while being in a social setting and remaining subject for a monetary bonus. The researchers also connected ToM to the concept of social orientation, with inward and outward types of orientation being available. According to Ridinger and McBride (2015), the inward orientation would force individuals to place more weight on their own welfare, and the outward orientation would mean placing emphasis on the greater good. In line with the researchers’ claims, most human behaviors are affected by one’s social orientation.
The major purpose of the study conducted by Ridinger and McBride (2015) was to see if the strength of ToM ability could be predicted by the presence of money in interpersonal interaction. In other words, the researchers presupposed that even the structure of the given monetary incentives could impact a person’s ToM ability. The differences between genders were noted as one of the potentially decisive factors for future research.
The hypothesis that Ridinger and McBride (2015) intended to test was the increasing effect of money on male motivation that crowded out in the case of female motivation.
The grouping variable within the framework of Ridinger and McBride’s (2015) research was human behavior, with three instances included in the study: individual, charity, and winner-take-all. The dependent variable utilized by the researchers was the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test (RMET) result.
The total number of participants was N=238, with all of them being students. Every respondent was recruited from a subject pool that included students from the entire campus. Every student was from a diverse ethnic background, with no particular sample characteristics affecting the researchers’ decision to include them in the study. Ridinger and McBride (2015) placed each of the students inside a computer laboratory in order to take part in experimental sessions where they would pass the RMET test.
As for the measures used in the study, each of the participants was assigned to a random computer terminal upon arrival at the laboratory. After getting acquainted with study instructions, study participants were required to look at cropped photographs of the eyes of an individual, one at a time. There would be four emotions to select from in order to pick the best one matching the eyes in the image (Ridinger & McBride, 2015). After advancing through all pictures of eyes, they would receive feedback regarding their test performance.
There were three particular test conditions that were expected to influence the outcome of the study. The first condition was an individual incentive, where the subject was paid $0.40 for every correct answer when taking the RMET (Ridinger & McBride, 2015). It was stated in the instructions that each correct choice would give the respondent $0.40. All personal earnings were distributed privately after the end of the experiment. The second condition was the winner-take-all incentive, where students were divided into groups of four. The person with most correct answers would receive $40, and three other students would receive $0. The third condition was the charity incentive, where study participants were told that their earnings would go to anonymous charity donations. This incentive was expected to drive an outward orientation and have the subjects donate the money to a charity of their choice.
Based on Figure 1A from Ridinger and McBride’s (2015) research article, the highest earnings were obtained when the charity incentive was in place. The individual and winner-takes-all incentives were relatively similar in terms of student output regardless of their gender. In Figure 1B, certain differences between genders can be found. For example, one condition where men significantly outperform women is the winner-take-all incentive (Ridinger & McBride, 2015). As for female participants, women’s baseline condition was only outperformed throughout the charity incentive. At the same time, men’s performance was lower than women’s baseline condition in all three cases. The only scenario where men’s performance comes close to women’s baseline is the winner-take-all incentive.
The two inferential statistical procedures used in Ridinger and McBride’s (2015) study were hypothesis testing and regression analyses.
The research hypothesis shared by the researchers was richly supported with data. Ridinger and McBride (2015) found that behaviors could be affected by ToM during a variety of scenarios, such as charitable giving, bargaining, or even tax evasion. Therefore, individual decision-making can be seen as directly dependent on one’s ability to read others’ emotions. Speaking of the difference between men and women when exposed to competition and compensation, there was one crucial finding shared by the researchers. Ridinger and McBride (2015) noted that women resort to pursuing the greater good, and most men engage in competition to display their authority.
The two practical applications of the findings shared by Ridinger and McBride (2015) include conflict resolution and employee motivation strategies.
In line with Ridinger and McBride (2015), future research on the subject could use monetary incentives more often in order to test people’s ToM capability. My suggestion is to focus on gender imbalance in terms of conflict resolution and see how men and women could be equally driven to maintain a peaceful environment at home or in the workplace.
One particular limitation mentioned by Ridinger and McBride (2015) was the lack of evidence on how men’s and women’s performance could be leveled out at all times. My observation was that researchers did not provide any reasonable explanation for the fact that baseline and charity scores were almost identical for women and somewhat different for men.
Reference
Ridinger, G., & McBride, M. (2015). Money affects theory of mind differently by gender. PLoS One, 10(12), e0143973. Web.