OHIO — An Ohio university is rewarding students for “good behavior” during the pandemic in an effort to prevent COVID-19 outbreaks on campus. But does this really work considering college students all across the country have received warnings and have even been suspended for violating COVID-19 campus policies?  

What You Need To Know

  • If students are on board with administration and like the school, they're much more likely to make sacrifices

  • Psychologists say punishment alone is not effective in trying to get students not to violate COVID policies

  • Positive results can come when schools have developed COVID-educated cultures that work together against COVID-19 even though there are consequences for violations and rewards for good behavior

Concern over COVID-19 outbreaks on college campuses prompted schools to implement policies early on that included consequences, but many across the country violated those policies forcing some universities, like Ohio State, to suspend students. 

While some colleges developed campaigns to create COVID-19 responsible cultures, others like Otterbein University took it a step further. They’re giving things like gift cards, pizza and even hosting pop-up events for students to reward responsible behavior. Elijah McCutcheon, 20, seems to think it’s working, even though the university limited large gatherings, Greek life events and a host of other things.

“I think it puts the students in a different position where they know that you're not doing this for nothing," McCutcheon said.

Clinical Psychologist and Otterbein Professor of Psychology Noam Shpancer said having consequences to protect the good of all is one thing, but rewards are necessary and do work.

“Punishment alone is going to fail long term. It's not effective in teaching and introduces a lot of negative feelings and actually trains people in negative behaviors," said Shpancer. 

Shpancer believes universities won’t have a 100 percent success rate when it comes to students following COVID-19 guidelines, but with a COVID-educated culture, consequences and rewards, positive results can come out of it.

“If students are aligned and identify and like the school, they're much more likely to make sacrifices," Shpancer said. 

Although Otterbein is considered a small university compared to others in the state, they’ve still managed to keep their COVID-19 cases low. Less than 50 symptomatic students have tested positive since August.

"A lot of that of what students will end up learning from this experience and how they end up behaving will depend on how we interact with them and how we treat them and what kind of structure we provide around them to support their movement in the right direction,” Shpancer said.

For students like Liz Boehringer, that support and the rewards mean a lot. 

“It’s nice to know that like the university is trying to work with us to, like, give us the best experience possible," Boehringer said. 

University officials believe the rewards, along with a number of other protocols in place, are helping to keep their case counts low.

Shpancer suggests universities continue to educate students about COVID-19 and understand what motivates students who do violate policies as they hand out punishments to help change behavior.