What would make a smoker more likely to quit, a big reward for succeeding or a little penalty for failing? That is what research

admin2017-12-19  42

问题    What would make a smoker more likely to quit, a big reward for succeeding or a little penalty for failing? That is what researchers wanted to know when they assigned a large group of CVS employees(CVS Caremark is the country’s largest drugstore chain by sales), their relatives and friends to different smoking cessation programs.
   "Adding a bit of a stick was much better than a pure carrot. These large employers are spending an average of $800 to $900 per employee per year, but in ways that are often blind to normal human psychology" said Dr. Scott Halpern, who led the study. The trial was intended to change that. Researchers randomly assigned the participants to a number of program options and let them decide whether they wanted to participate. The penalty program required participants to deposit $150; six months later, those who had quit smoking would get the deposit back, along with a $650 reward. In the reward-only program, participants were simply offered an $800 payment if they stayed off cigarettes for six months.
   The trial, which was described in The New England Journal of Medicine on Wednesday, was the largest yet to test whether offering people financial incentives could lead to better health. Researchers found that offering incentives was far more effective in getting people to stop smoking than the traditional approach of giving free smoking cessation help, such as counseling or nicotine replacement therapy like gum, medication or patches. But they also found that requiring a $150 deposit that would be lost if the person failed to stay off cigarettes for six months nearly doubled the chances of success.
   "This is an original set of findings," said Cass R. Sunstein, a Harvard law professor who helped develop some influential ideas in the field of behavioral economics, notably that if the social environment can be changed—for example, by posting simple warnings—people can be nudged into better behavior. "They could be applied to many health issues, like alcoholism, or whenever people face serious self-control problems."
   Over all, success eluded most of the study participants. More than 80 percent of smokers in the most popular pure rewards group were still smoking at the end of the study. Even so, researchers say, their success rate was far greater than for those who got the traditional treatment. Smoking is the largest cause of preventable death in the United States. Diseases linked to it kill more than 480,000 Americans a year. And even a small decline could have a big health effect.
The underlined word "that" in Paragraph 2 refers to the situation that______.

选项 A、using a carrot is worse than using a stick
B、the spending on physical examination is less
C、employers ignore normal human psychology of their staff
D、large companies put too much money in their employees

答案C

解析 细节题。根据题干关键词Paragraph 2定位到第二段。The trial was intended to change that,此处的that指代的是斯科特.哈尔彭博士所说的情况,尤其是最后指出的 “但他们花钱时却往往对正常人员心理层面上的因素视而不见”。C项“用人单位忽视了 他们员工的正常人员心理层面上的因素”是that指代的内容,故C项为正确答案,并排 除D项“大型用人单位在他们的员工身上花费太多”。A项“用萝卜比用大棒更糟糕”是 对首句字面意思的误解。B项“在体检上的花销比较少”原文没有提及。
转载请注明原文地址:https://kaotiyun.com/show/QLBZ777K
0

随机试题
最新回复(0)