[Prizes and Productivity: How Winning the Fields Medal Affects Scientific Output](http://www3.nd.edu/~tjohns20/RePEc/deendus/wpaper/022_Fields.pdf) (2013)

> Knowledge generation is key to economic growth, and scientific prizes
> are designed to encourage it. But how does winning a prestigious prize
> affect future output? We compare the productivity of Fields medalists
> (winners of the top mathematics prize) to that of similarly brilliant
> contenders. The two groups have similar publication rates until the
> award year, after which the winners’ productivity declines. The
> medalists begin to “play the field,” studying unfamiliar topics at the
> expense of writing papers. It appears that tournaments can have large
> post-prize effects on the effort allocation of knowledge producers.

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