AEA RCT Registry currently lists 12302 studies with locations in 171 countries.
Our proposed work builds from Bartling, Weber, and Yao (2015) by using an RCT to examine choices in a laboratory market in which we vary the way a negative externality associated with a transaction is characterized. Like Bartling et al. (2015), we use a fictious product in a laboratory setting with real stakes and real impacts on a bystander. In the experiment by Bartling et al. (2015), consumers can choose between a socially responsible product and a product that produces a negative externality for a bystander. The authors find that people are willing to forgo personal benefit to choose a socially responsible product. Our protocol differs from Bartling et al. (2015) in some important ways. First, instead of choosing which of two products to sell, the seller can choose to sell a product...
This experiment studies optimal nonlinear pricing schemes and the role of inattention for nonlinear pricing.
We study whether ideological alignment and descriptive-norm (popularity) cues drive policy diffusion among Spanish municipalities. Municipalities receive an email offering a free Wikipedia update service and information about prior adopters. We experimentally vary (i) whether highlighted prior adopters are ideologically aligned or cross-partisan relative to the recipient, and (ii) whether the email implies high or low adoption rates. The 2×2 factorial design (plus two popularity-only arms and a pure control) allows causal identification of alignment effects, popularity-cue effects, and their interaction. The pre-analysis plan is attached as a supplementary document.
Survey-based measures of firm expectations are key inputs to leading economic indicators, yet expectations must be elicited through survey instruments whose design may itself shape responses. This study provides randomized experimental evidence on whether the position of expectation questions within a business-survey questionnaire affects measured expectations. Firms in the ifo Business Survey are randomly assigned, within strata defined by firm size and sector, to one of three arms that differ only in question order. In the control arm (A), expectation questions follow a block of neutral filler questions. In treatment arm B, expectation questions follow a block of substantive firm-related questions on operating costs, skilled-labor availability, and competitive intensity. In treatment ...
Over the past two decades, the United States has witnessed high-profile cases of police brutality (e.g., the murder of George Floyd in 2020) which has shaken public confidence in the ability of police to protect the public. Consequently, there has been interest in reducing how and when officers use force without compromising the department's commitment to public safety. One way to achieve this goal is to hire officers who already demonstrate the ability to make accurate decisions in high-stakes scenarios. We will conduct a pilot, laboratory-based, incentivized experiment to explore whether and how applicants with low predictable error rates in deadly force decisions and strong cognitive ability respond to different types of recruitment campaigns. The goal of this pilot study is to devel...
We test for ethnic and national-origin discrimination in the rental housing market of Wilayah Persekutuan Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, using a paired correspondence design with a behavioural-intervention layer. Synthetic applicant inquiries varying ethnicity (Bumiputera, Chinese, Indian), nationality (Malaysian, Singaporean, Chinese, British, American), gender, and age are sent to 2,400 listings on Mudah.com (private-landlord-dominant) and PropertyGuru (agent-dominant). A randomised information-disclosure treatment varies whether the inquiry includes additional applicant characteristics (occupation, length-of-stay intent, etc.). The design tests three contributions: 1. Response-margin discrimination by ethnicity and nationality in a multi-ethnic, post-colonial federal-governance setti...
The Creating Moves to Opportunity (CMTO) was a housing mobility program offered to families newly issued housing vouchers in the Seattle and King County, Washington region. An experimental evaluation of the program showed that it led to sizable effects on moves to high opportunity areas, or areas that offer the best prospects for children’s upward mobility. The program also led to large effects on residence in high opportunity areas after three years. This study examines the program’s effects for up to seven years after study start on housing outcomes, parents’ employment and earnings, and children’s school performance. Impacts will be estimated using school records data and UI wage records from Washington State, public housing agency records, records from the Homeless Management Infor...
Sustainable finance has become an increasingly important part of the investment landscape. This project studies how sustainability-related features of financial products influence investment decisions and whether these effects differ by gender. Using a behavioral experiment, the study examines decision-making in financial contexts where sustainability information is included in the product offering. The findings will contribute to research on gender and sustainable finance, and may provide insights for the design of investment products that appeal to a broader range of investors.
This study evaluates the impacts of take-up of an insurance-based financial package designed to mitigate drought risk among pastoral households in Ethiopia and Kenya. The package combines subsidized index-based livestock insurance, a mobile banking account, an enrollment bonus, and savings incentives. We use a randomized encouragement design based on two sets of community-level interventions (an information campaign and an agent-incentive scheme) that were designed to shift the probability of package take-up. Our main estimand is the local average treatment effect of take-up on six outcome categories. Productivity, investment, and resilience are pre-specified as primary outcome categories. Financial inclusion, mental health, and intra-household conflict are secondary outcomes in this an...
We investigate which characteristics of sellers induce greater effort to enhance their reputation. In particular, we focus on (i) the absolute quality of the goods a seller deals in, and (ii) the relative quality of those goods compared with the goods dealt in by another seller in the market. In the experiment, we randomly assign the quality-types to sellers. One of them is assigned to a relatively high-quality type, and another is assigned to a relatively low-quality type. The absolute quality-type determines the default signal distribution, and the signal realization determines the revenue of the player. Each player can manipulate their own signal distribution, but not others, by paying some costs. We investigate whether the own quality-type and/or relative position in the session mat...