From Whom Do Children Acquire Information and How Does It Impact Learning

Last registered on May 03, 2023
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Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
From Whom Do Children Acquire Information and How Does It Impact Learning
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0011337
Initial registration date
April 26, 2023

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
May 03, 2023, 4:18 PM EDT

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

Locations

Country
Norway
Region

Primary Investigator

Name
Marlis Schneider
Affiliation
Norwegian School of Economics
Contact Primary Investigator

Other Primary Investigator(s)

Additional Trial Information

Status
Completed
Start date
2023-03-17
End date
2023-04-28
Keywords
Behavior
Additional Keywords
Social learning; information acquisition, belief updating
JEL code(s)
Secondary IDs
Prior work
This trial does not extend or rely on any prior RCTs.
Abstract
This paper studies from whom children decide to acquire information from and how it affects their learning in the jar drawing task. Besides the endogenous information acquisition and learning, the project is interested in exploring whether there is a socioeconomic gradient regarding information acquisition. The experiment will be run in a lab-in-the-field setup in Norwegian schools and the study population are 10th graders in the spring of 2023.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Schneider, Marlis. 2023. "From Whom Do Children Acquire Information and How Does It Impact Learning." AEA RCT Registry. May 03. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.11337-1.0
Sponsors & Partners
Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
Intervention Start Date
2023-03-27
Intervention End Date
2023-04-26

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
Decisions (beliefs) - a value between 4 and 16.
Decisions (choice of information source) - Choice from whom to observe draw/guess from
Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Belief movement, confidence (value between 0 and 100)
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
Individuals make two decisions in a balls-and-urns paradigm. Individuals first form an independent posterior belief based on a set of draws and state their confidence level. Then they are given an opportunity to learn the [draw/guess] from one of two individual presented to them that have observed a different set of draws from the same urn. The experiment varies the choice set of individuals to choose from as well as the associated draw size. Individuals then make a second decision which is continuous belief and a confidence level.

Individuals are assigned to a treatment upon entry. The treatments are listed in the sample size section.
Experimental Design Details

Randomization Method
Participants are assigned to one of the treatment arms upon entering the experiment application (programmed in oTree/Python).

Participants are assigned to one state of the urn (programmed in oTree/python) using a random number generator.
Randomization Unit
Individual level.
Was the treatment clustered?
No

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
None
Sample size: planned number of observations
Approximately 1000 students
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
250 draw adult, 250 adult university, 250 guess adult, 250 guess adult university
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
Supporting Documents and Materials
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
NHH-IRB
IRB Approval Date
2023-03-07
IRB Approval Number
42/22
Analysis Plan

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