Impacts of Access to the Internet

Last registered on October 29, 2018

Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Impacts of Access to the Internet
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0002550
Initial registration date
October 28, 2018

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
October 29, 2018, 5:18 PM EDT

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

Locations

Region

Primary Investigator

Affiliation
MIT Sloan School

Other Primary Investigator(s)

Additional Trial Information

Status
On going
Start date
2017-10-11
End date
2018-12-31
Secondary IDs
Abstract
According to recent studies, the mobile internet in Kenya is among the fastest globally. There is an assumption that high-speed Internet has an impact on people’s lives as new Internet users have access to a vast amount of resources and can improve their own skills, employability and access to jobs. However, there is no research that illustrates the impacts of mobile Internet access. The purpose of the study is to understand how access to the Internet affects people’s lives. This project will study how access to data-enabled phones provide access to high speed mobile internet for people and how this affects peoples’ social and economic lives, whether they are able to search for job opportunities, learn skills, etc. over the internet.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Suri, Tavneet. 2018. "Impacts of Access to the Internet." AEA RCT Registry. October 29. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.2550-1.0
Former Citation
Suri, Tavneet. 2018. "Impacts of Access to the Internet." AEA RCT Registry. October 29. https://www.socialscienceregistry.org/trials/2550/history/36426
Sponsors & Partners

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Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
Safaricom implemented a randomized controlled trial based on administrative data that provides individuals with access to free (internet) data. They created two treatment groups and a control, with 2,000 individuals in each group. The two treatment groups were:

1: 5GB of free data, valid for 90 days and renewed 4 times
2: 15GB of free data, valid for 90 days and renewed 4 times

Intervention Start Date
2017-10-11
Intervention End Date
2018-07-01

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
Use of the internet and social media, social networks, attitudes (social and political), aspirations and economic opportunities (employment, migration)
Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
There are two treatment groups that get free data (these are individuals who have never used data before). One group gets 5GB for free and the second gets 15GB for free. The free data offers were valid for 90 days. The offers were then repeated four times so that the treated individuals had free data for a year.

The sample from which the treatment and control groups were chosen was restricted by Safaricom as follows:

(i) Safaricom customers who have data enabled phones but who have not used data before (those with 0MBs of data use in the 18 months prior to the experiment and those not in the top percentile of data expenditures (a small number of individuals had purchased data at some point, even though they had not used any of it).

(ii) Among this sample, they then dropped those with below median revenues in the last 2 months, or with below median revenues in the last 6 months or those with less than median voice revenue in the last 2 months. The aim of this restriction was to ensure that these customers were active users of Safaricom and not SIM cards that are out of service or not used much.

From this final sample of customers, Safaricom chose a random 4,000 to receive free data. Half of these 4,000 were in the 5GB treatment group, and half in the 15GB treatment group.

These 4,000 will be compared to a control group of 2,000 chosen also at random from the same sample of customers described above. Should we need a bigger control group for power, we can go back to the original sample and add more consumers to the control group as the treatment individuals were chosen at random from the described sampling frame.
Experimental Design Details
Randomization Method
Randomization done in an office by a computer (using Stata code)
Randomization Unit
Individuals
Was the treatment clustered?
No

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
4,000 individuals treated
Sample size: planned number of observations
6,000 individuals total (though the control group can be expanded as the study group was chosen at random from a sub-population of customers)
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
2,000 individuals get 5GB of free data, valid for 90 days and renewed 4 times
2,000 individuals get 15GB of free data, valid for 90 days and renewed 4 times
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
MIT Committee on the Use of Humans as Experimental Subjects
IRB Approval Date
2017-12-08
IRB Approval Number
1710120749

Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

Study Withdrawal

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Intervention

Is the intervention completed?
No
Data Collection Complete
Data Publication

Data Publication

Is public data available?
No

Program Files

Program Files
Reports, Papers & Other Materials

Relevant Paper(s)

Reports & Other Materials