Islamophobia, Legitimacy and Social Desirability: MTurk Online Survey

Last registered on July 06, 2020

View Trial History

Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title

Islamophobia, Legitimacy and Social Desirability: MTurk Online Survey

RCT ID

AEARCTR-0001994

Initial registration date

February 05, 2017

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published

February 05, 2017, 1:19 PM EST

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Last updated

July 06, 2020, 8:41 PM EDT

Last updated is the most recent time when changes to the trial's registration were published.

Locations

Country

United States of America

Region

States where Donald Trump won the presidential election

Primary Investigator

Name

Stefano Fiorin

Affiliation

Bocconi University

Contact Primary Investigator

Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Name

Leonardo Bursztyn

PI Affiliation

University of Chicago

Contact Investigator

Additional Trial Information

Status

Completed

Start date

2017-01-01

End date

2017-03-31

Keywords

Electoral

Additional Keywords

Islamophobia, Social Desirability, Donations, Legitimacy, Elections

JEL code(s)

Secondary IDs

Abstract

We will recruit survey participants on MTurk to conduct an online survey. With this survey, we plan to study whether the legitimacy (in the sense of conformity to the law) of a certain political view also affects its social desirability.
First, all subjects will answer a few demographic questions. Second, they will be randomized into three groups. Subjects in the control group will receive no information. Subjects in the "popular" treatment group will be told that a large proportion of survey respondents support an anti-Muslim policy. Subjects in the "unconstitutional" treatment group will also be told that this anti-Muslim policy is unconstitutional. Third, we will measure their beliefs about the popularity of the anti-Muslim policy. Given the tone of the current political discourse, the "popular" treatment might not change our subjects' beliefs about the popularity of the anti-Muslim policy. However, it is important to test that these beliefs are not affected by the "unconstitutional treatment". Fourth, we will measure subjects willingness to donate money to an anti-Muslim organization promoting the policy. In particular, we will offer them a $1 compensation if they agree on allowing us to donate $1 to the anti-Muslim organization of their behalf. Customers will be randomized into two groups: in one group we will emphasize that their decision is private; in the other group we will tell subjects that "a member of the research team might personally contact you to verify your answers", thus making the decision to be perceived as public. We will test our hypothesis by comparing the donation decisions of subjects in the six (3x2) experimental groups. Again, given the election results our subjects might already believe that a vast proportion of citizens support anti-Muslim policies. If this is the case, there might not exist a wedge between public and private donation rates in the control group which the "popular" treatment could reduce. Since what we are particularly interested in is whether the "unconstitutional" treatment increase the wedge by diminishing the perceived social desirability of supporting anti-Muslim policies, it is still important to have the "popular" treatment group to control for the effect of popular support.

External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation

Bursztyn, Leonardo and Stefano Fiorin. 2020. "Islamophobia, Legitimacy and Social Desirability: MTurk Online Survey." AEA RCT Registry. July 06. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.1994-4.0

Former Citation

Bursztyn, Leonardo and Stefano Fiorin. 2020. "Islamophobia, Legitimacy and Social Desirability: MTurk Online Survey." AEA RCT Registry. July 06. https://www.socialscienceregistry.org/trials/1994/history/71881

Sponsors & Partners

Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)

Intervention Start Date

2017-02-06

Intervention End Date

2017-02-28

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)

Beliefs about the popularity of anti-Muslim policies. Donation decisions.

Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Beliefs about the popularity of anti-Muslim policies are the answer to the following question. .

"Out of 100 people, how many do you think would say in an anonymous survey that they think Muslims should be prohibited from holding public office?”

Donation decisions are the answer to the following question.

"ACT for America is the largest grassroots anti-Muslim organization in the U.S actively working to promote anti-Muslim legislation and opinion. The founder of ACT for America is Brigitte Gabriel, the author of a book titled “They Must Be Stopped” and who argued that Muslims should be prohibited from holding public office because “a practicing Muslim, who believes in the teachings of the Koran, cannot be a loyal citizen of the United States.” ACT for America believes that Muslims represent a threat to both national security and American values; its Thin Blue Line project comprehensively mapped the addresses of U.S. Muslim student associations and other Islamic institutions as sites of national security concern.

Would you like to have us donate $1 on your behalf to ACT for America?

If you decide to have $1 donated to the anti-Muslim organization ACT for America, we will also transfer $1 extra to your MTurk account. So, if you decide to donate, instead of $0.50, you will be paid $1.50 in total. If instead you prefer not to donate, you will only be paid $0.50 for completing the survey.

So would you like to have us donate $1 on your behalf to ACT for America?"

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)

Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

We will recruit survey participants on MTurk to conduct an online survey.
First, all subjects will answer a few demographic questions. Second, they will be randomized into three groups. Subjects in the control group will receive no information. Subjects in the "popular" treatment group will be told that a large proportion of survey respondents support an anti-Muslim policy. Subjects in the "unconstitutional" treatment group will also be told that this anti-Muslim policy is unconstitutional. Third, we will measure their beliefs about the popularity of the anti-Muslim policy. Fourth, we will measure subjects willingness to donate money to an anti-Muslim organization promoting the policy. Customers will be randomized into two groups: in one group we will emphasize that their decision is private; in the other group we will tell subjects that "a member of the research team might personally contact you to verify your answers", thus making the decision to be perceived as public. We will test our hypothesis by comparing the donation decisions of subjects in the six (3x2) experimental groups.

Experimental Design Details

Randomization Method

The randomization will be done on Qualtrics, a website for conducting online surveys.

Randomization Unit

The unit of randomization will be the individual subject.

Was the treatment clustered?

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters

N/A

Sample size: planned number of observations

600 individuals

Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms

100 control group private, 100 control group public, 100 popular support private, 100 popular support public, 100 unconstitutional private, 100 unconstitutional public.

Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)

N/A

Supporting Documents and Materials

IRB