Drive, Instinct, Anchor, and Hook: A behavioral framework and preregistered test protocols of the Public License Premium

Consider why a manager might pay personal costs to publicly discipline a rule-breaker when private discipline achieves identical deterrent effects and satisfaction. We propose a four-engine behavioral framework that separates homeostatic Drive, acute defensive Instinct, mirror-independent Anchor work, and a coalition-bound Hook mechanism we operationalize as a Public License Premium (PLP). PLP is the additional price participants will pay to make a norm action public to an in-group audience when, by design, a private alternative matches both instrumental outcomes and retributive satisfaction. We isolate visibility from evaluation and arousal, and we distinguish in-group from out-group audiences. We outline three preregistered study protocols to test falsifiable predictions: in-group visibility increases PLP only when a role-based license is present, PLP collapses with an out-group or when any component is ablated, and the Anchor Index predicts performance only in verified-private work and is uncorrelated with PLP. The program will rely on revealed-preference measures, preregistered analyses, and equivalence tests for critical nulls. If confirmed, Hook is not generic reputation or threat, and Anchor is not display. If disconfirmed, the framework fails. Keywords: Drive, Instinct, Anchor, Hook, Public License Premium, in-group visibility, role-based license, audience effects, revealed preference