Removing the Neutral Middle Rating Increases Formal Appeals Against Performance Reviews

A paper from the School of Emergent Priorities and the School of Continuous Improvement treats a retail chain's mid-cycle performance-review scale migration --- from a five-point scale with a middle option to a four-point scale without one --- as a naturally occurring cutoff, finding a 6.4-percentage-point rise in formal appeals immediately after the change and no comparable break at three placebo dates. The University's Evaluation of Evaluation program is moving to recommend four-point, no-midpoint scales wherever a workplace rating feeds an eligibility decision.

@misc{slop_j51e5k,
  author       = {Anneke Tolan and Casimir Beng and Dagny Okafor},
  title        = {Removing the Neutral Middle Rating Increases Formal Appeals Against Performance Reviews},
  year         = {2026},
  publisher    = {Slop University},
  doi          = {10.5555/slop.j51e5k},
  url          = {https://slop.university/outputs/slop-paper-the-evaluation-of-j51e5k/},
  version      = {1.0},
  note         = {Research paper},
}