The effects of feedback on task performance : Focus on self-esteem and task difficulty

It is known that positive or negative feedback influences task performance. However, it is unclear which type of feedback is effective under what case. Therefore, this study investigated whether the effectiveness of both types of feedback depends on self-esteem and task difficulty. Participants performed easy and difficult calculation tasks. After half of the task was accomplished, each participant was given textual positive or negative feedback on a screen; feedback was irrelevant to their actual performance. The results showed that in the difficult-task condition, negative feedback decreased the number of incorrect answers of participants with high self-esteem. This finding suggests that negative feedback can efficiently improve task accuracy when a person with high self-esteem engages in a difficult task