The effort-reward imbalance

Have you ever heard of the effort-reward imbalance?

It’s a situation where we put a lot of effort into something, but get little or no reward for it.

The negative health effects of such an imbalance in work are well documented: employees who feel that their efforts are unappreciated tend to end up with more heart disease and mental health problems. The basic premise is just as relevant for students: we are wired to expect ‘fairness’ from the world around us. When we work hard on an essay or a presentation, we expect positive feedback. But life is often unfair… so why would studying be an exception?

Writing this feels like breaking a taboo. From early childhood, our parents and teachers tell us that, if we try hard, we will succeed. Popular culture celebrates effort and links it to victory, suggesting we can achieve anything we put our mind to. But there comes a time when we find out that life is not exactly a vending machine into which you insert effort and get out achievement. Or if it is, it’s a glitchy vending machine, sometimes doling out underwhelming rewards or failing to deliver them altogether.

It’s happened to all of us

Can you think of an example when you worked hard, but were not (adequately) rewarded for it? As a teacher, I had a few seriously hardworking students who never managed to make the progress they’d hoped for, like David (not his real name), a young man whose memory was so weak that, despite months of trying, he simply couldn’t memorise the vocabulary needed for his Spanish exam. The grade he ended up with was not the grade he deserved. As an MPhil student, I worked so obsessively on my dissertation that I ended up excelling in it, but underperforming in exam subjects, which affected my grade average and cost me the funding for further study.

It’s important to say this: When it comes to studying, the effort-reward imbalance can be real. Talking about this feels like a transgression, because society is always trying to get us to focus on the positives. I know life is not always fair, and your hard work is not always celebrated or even seen. I’m here for you if you currently find yourself in that situation. And while we don’t know if our hard work will be justly rewarded at any point, we can be 100% sure of one thing: without effort, there will be no reward of any sort.

So we try again.