Intervention(s)
The intervention is situated in Assis, Brazil, a region heavily reliant on agricultural activities. Our study employs a well-structured lab in the field experiment framed with real economic incentives, complemented by survey data. Participants will engage with a questionnaire in loco, individually, electronically, and with an anticipated completion time ranging from 90 to 120 minutes.
Our primary objective is to examine the presence of correlation neglect in the participants decisions, gauging not only its presence, but also the extent to which it manifests. In particular, we aim at understanding how correlation neglect relates with both the degree of correlation across decision problems and the individual degree of risk aversion among participants.
Next, we intend to evaluate the impact of integrated information provision on mitigating correlation neglect and/or fostering increased crop diversification. To discern such effects, participants will be randomly assigned to either the integrated or segregated information treatments. While the informational content remains consistent across both groups, the representation of assets’ returns differs—presented either jointly in a single graph or distinctly in two separate graphs.
As a secondary objective, we investigate whether the participants’ beliefs about the distribution of returns is more accurate when the information is provided jointly. For this reason, we include belief elicitation questions following the allocation decision problems.