Sending 'motivational' emails to people looking for jobs actually makes them less likely to find one.
March 19, 2026
Original Paper
Motivating Job Seekers. A Field Experiment
SSRN · 6412783
The Takeaway
A massive study of 200,000 people found that 'carrot' emails suggested the government was less strict than assumed, causing people to search less. 'Stick' emails backfired by demotivating those who already had an inner drive, proving that low-cost digital nudges can be actively counterproductive.
From the abstract
Reduced motivation among jobseekers over the unemployment spell may lead to declining job-finding rates. We report findings from a low-cost digital intervention with motivational emails aimed at enhancing and sustaining motivation and search effort among job seekers in Sweden. Using a randomized controlled trial that included 200,720 job seekers, we evaluate both carrot messages aimed at encouraging the pursuit of personal goals and intrinsic motivation and stick messages focusing on external pr