Asymmetric information, parental involvement and child health

Last registered on May 21, 2025
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Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Asymmetric information, parental involvement and child health
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0013824
Initial registration date
May 09, 2025

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 21, 2025, 11:52 AM EDT

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

Locations

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Primary Investigator

Name
Manish Kumar Prasad
Affiliation
Indian Institute of Management Kozhikode
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Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Name
Chitwan Lalji
PI Affiliation
IIM Kozhikode
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PI Name
Debayan Pakrashi
PI Affiliation
Indian Statistical Institute Kolkata
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Additional Trial Information

Status
On going
Start date
2024-07-24
End date
2028-12-24
Keywords
Behavior, Education, Gender, Health, Other, Welfare
Additional Keywords
nutrition, maternal and child health, parental involvement, awareness
JEL code(s)
D10, I12, O12, J13
Secondary IDs
Prior work
This trial does not extend or rely on any prior RCTs.
Abstract
This study will focus on the impact of two behavior change communication (BCC) interventions (participatory theatre and short movies) on sensitizing fathers and its effect in improving early childhood development in rural households. We plan to understand in detail how aware parents are about their children's abilities, physical health and overall development. We believe that since mothers are mostly primary caregivers, they will be more engaged and aware about their children's health and development vis-a-vis the father of the children, who mostly controls the resources and is the key decision maker within the household. Therefore, we will study the effect of two BCC interventions (participatory theatre vis-a-vis short movies) in reducing the asymmetric information among fathers. We will study the effect of these interventions on children's physical health and cognitive abilities.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Lalji, Chitwan, Debayan Pakrashi and Manish Kumar Prasad. 2025. "Asymmetric information, parental involvement and child health." AEA RCT Registry. May 21. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.13824-1.0
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Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
This study will take place in two different blocks in the district of Ramgarh in the state of Jharkhand, India. There will be two treatment groups: Treatment 1 – Participatory theatre (PT) intervention and Treatment 2 – Short movie (SM) intervention. There will be one control group as well, which will not receive any intervention. The intervention will be conducted by a local NGO (implementation partner). Out of the 75 villages randomly selected from the two blocks, 25 villages will be randomly assigned to the PT intervention (Treatment 1), while another 25 villages will be randomly assigned for the short movie intervention (Treatment 2) and the remaining 25 villages will be randomly assigned as the control group.

Around 17 households (on average) will then be randomly selected from each village. Around 1300 households in total with around 430 households in each of the treatment and control arms will be our sample size for this study. The inclusion criteria for this intervention shall be married women aged 18-50 years and their husbands, who have at least one child aged below 5 years of age.
Intervention Start Date
2025-05-09
Intervention End Date
2025-07-15

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
Knowledge gained during the intervention, Household Decision making , Communication with spouse, Gender Roles and Gender Attitudes and Time Use
Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Knowledge about Child specific information: height, weight, overall development, vaccination and MCP card details, health and hygiene, dietary diversity of the child, etc.
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
We shall employ a three-staged randomization technique. In the first stage, we shall randomly select 75 villages from the list of villages of different blocks in Ramgarh District, Jharkhand, India. In the second stage, 17 households on average shall be randomly selected from each village. The household inclusion criteria shall be a husband-wife-child trio, with wife aged 18-50 years and with at least one child aged below 5 years of age. In the third stage, the 75 villages shall be randomly assigned to either of the three treatment or control groups (two treatment arms and one control group): treatment group 1 (Participatory theatre intervention), treatment group 2 (short movie intervention) and the control group (with no intervention).
Experimental Design Details
Not available
Randomization Method
randomization will be done on an office computer using STATA software.
Randomization Unit
Village level
Was the treatment clustered?
Yes

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
75 villages
Sample size: planned number of observations
Around 1300 father-mother-child trio.
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
Treatment 1 - participatory theatre (PT) intervention (25 villages), Treatment 2 - short movie (SM) intervention (25 villages) and Control: 25 villages.
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
Supporting Documents and Materials
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
Indian Institute of Management Kozhikode
IRB Approval Date
2024-07-12
IRB Approval Number
IRB/207/04072024
Analysis Plan