Metamotivational Beliefs about Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivation

With 4 studies (N = 971), we examined people’s metamotivational beliefs about intrinsic vs. extrinsic motivation. Overall, participants reported that upregulating intrinsic motivation benefits open-ended tasks and upregulating extrinsic motivation benefits closed-ended tasks, which demonstrates knowledge of task-motivation fit. Further, knowledge was related to consequential behavioral choices and task performance.