Violence against women: The witness dilemma

Last registered on March 28, 2024
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Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Violence against women: The witness dilemma
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0011814
Initial registration date
July 20, 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
July 20, 2023, 5:56 PM EDT

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

Last updated
March 28, 2024, 7:48 AM EDT

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

Locations

Country
Spain
Region
Navarre

Primary Investigator

Name
Sara Martinez-de-Morentin
Affiliation
Universidad Publica de Navarra
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Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Name
Ariadna Garcia-Prado
PI Affiliation
Universidad Publica de Navarra
Contact Investigator
PI Name
Rebeca Echavarri
PI Affiliation
Universidad Publica de Navarra
Contact Investigator
PI Name
Fernanda Gutierrez-Navratil
PI Affiliation
Universidad de Oviedo
Contact Investigator

Additional Trial Information

Status
Completed
Start date
2023-05-22
End date
2023-07-31
Keywords
Behavior, Crime, Violence, & Conflict, Gender
Additional Keywords
JEL code(s)
Secondary IDs
Prior work
This trial is based on or builds upon one or more prior RCTs.
Abstract
In Spain, the reform of the Violence Against Women (VAW) law (Royal Decree-Law 9/2018) made it possible to report gender violence without going to the police or court. The advantage of this kind of “soft reporting” is that victims or witnesses can report to social services and thereby gain access to legal, economic and psychological support without having to identify or denounce the aggressor. It is expected that the availability of soft reporting will help to reduce costs and overcome barriers to reporting.

Results of a previous experiment (AEARCTR-0010397) showed that potential witnesses are more willing to intervene using the soft reporting option compared with the hard reporting option. In this study, we want to disentangle the main mechanisms that make people more inclined to intervene via soft reporting than via hard reporting. Specifically, our experiment is designed to isolate the relevance of three elements associated with the soft-reporting option: the fact that witnesses do not have to identify and denounce the aggressor, the fact that they do not have to identify themselves, and the fact that they do not have to go to the police.

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External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Gutierrez-Navratil, Fernanda et al. 2024. "Violence against women: The witness dilemma." AEA RCT Registry. March 28. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.11814-2.1
Sponsors & Partners

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Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
We perform an online experiment on individual decisions, embedded in an official Statistical Operation of the Government of Navarre (Spain), included in its 2021-2024 Statistics Plan (OE 2000473). We have access to a random representative sample of the population in
Navarre, aged 18-47 and selected from the census.

Intervention Start Date
2023-05-22
Intervention End Date
2023-07-31

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
Willingness to intervene under different reporting options.
Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Information about individual characteristics that may affect willingness to intervene: economic preferences, social behaviour and other socio-demographic variables.
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
Participants will read a realistic and well-explained hypothetical situation (a vignette) and, given this
context, will choose whether to intervene or not. They will be randomly assigned to one of four choice groups.
Experimental Design Details
Participants will read a realistic and well-explained scenario of violence against women (a vignette) and, given this
context, will choose whether to intervene or not. In particular, participants are presented with a choice task corresponding to one of the following scenarios: (1) Reporting to the social services, identifying themselves and identifying the neighbor to process a formal complaint; (2) Reporting to the social services, without identifying themselves but identifying the neighbor to process a formal complaint; (3) Reporting to the social services, identifying themselves without identifying the neighbor to process a formal complaint; (4) Reporting to the police, identifying themselves and identifying the neighbor to process a formal complaint. Each participant will be randomly allocated to one of these four scenarios.
Each participant receives an initial endowment of 30 euros. Participants who choose to intervene will give up part of the endowment (25 euros) in favor of a well-recognised NGO that helps victims of VAW. Those who decide not to intervene will keep the total endowment for themselves.
To enrich our capacity to interpret the results of this experiment, we complement this approach with a survey. Our survey extracts information about the preferences (e.g., risk attitudes) and beliefs of individuals, which allows us to examine mechanisms behind the
willingness to report VAW.
Randomization Method
Randomization done in office by a computer.
Randomization Unit
Individual.
Was the treatment clustered?
No

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
1000 individuals
Sample size: planned number of observations
1000 individuals
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
(1) Reporting to the social services, identifying themselves and identifying the neighbor to process a formal complaint: 250 individuals.
(2) Reporting to the social services, without identifying themselves but identifying the neighbor to process a formal complaint: 250 individuals.
(3) Reporting to the social services, identifying themselves without identifying the neighbor to process a formal complaint: 250 individuals.
(4) Reporting to the police, identifying themselves and identifying the neighbor to process a formal complaint: 250 individuals.
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
Supporting Documents and Materials
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
Ethics Committee of the Universidad Publica de Navarra
IRB Approval Date
2022-06-29
IRB Approval Number
N/A
Analysis Plan

Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

Study Withdrawal

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Intervention

Is the intervention completed?
Yes
Intervention Completion Date
July 31, 2023, 12:00 +00:00
Data Collection Complete
Yes
Data Collection Completion Date
July 31, 2023, 12:00 +00:00
Final Sample Size: Number of Clusters (Unit of Randomization)
No clusters included
Was attrition correlated with treatment status?
No
Final Sample Size: Total Number of Observations
969
Final Sample Size (or Number of Clusters) by Treatment Arms
(1) Reporting to the social services, identifying themselves and identifying the neighbor to process a formal complaint: 234 individuals. (2) Reporting to the social services, without identifying themselves but identifying the neighbor to process a formal complaint: 229 individuals. (3) Reporting to the social services, identifying themselves without identifying the neighbor to process a formal complaint: 264 individuals. (4) Reporting to the police, identifying themselves and identifying the neighbor to process a formal complaint: 242 individuals.
Data Publication

Data Publication

Is public data available?
No

Program Files

Program Files
Reports, Papers & Other Materials

Relevant Paper(s)

Reports & Other Materials