The effects of a web application supporting young adults neither in education, employment, nor training

Last registered on October 18, 2024

Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
The effects of a web application supporting young adults neither in education, employment, nor training
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0014376
Initial registration date
October 08, 2024

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
October 18, 2024, 4:39 PM 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

Affiliation
Universitetet i Stavanger

Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Affiliation
University of Stavanger

Additional Trial Information

Status
In development
Start date
2024-10-21
End date
2025-12-31
Secondary IDs
Research Council Norway: 296390
Prior work
This trial does not extend or rely on any prior RCTs.
Abstract
Technological advances and automation are making workplaces increasingly knowledge-intensive, with many routine and well-defined jobs becoming redundant. The new labor market requires workers with high competencies who are not afraid of change, challenges, and acquiring new skills. For many young adults, this could be a major risk factor for labor market exclusion. Indeed, today almost 10 percent of young adults in Norway are "Not in Education, Employment or Training" (NEET).

Based on protocols from psychology, we have developed an app (RØST), supporting young education or job applicants. By investigating the effects of RØST, this project will provide new knowledge about young NEETs, and how society can support them in entering the labor market or education.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Haaland, Venke and Mari Rege. 2024. "The effects of a web application supporting young adults neither in education, employment, nor training." AEA RCT Registry. October 18. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.14376-1.0
Sponsors & Partners

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Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
Intervention Start Date
2024-10-21
Intervention End Date
2025-12-31

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
(1) Register data measures on labor market participation or education enrollment: employed, earnings, enrollment in education, participation in labor market programs initiated by NAV.
(2) Survey measures on current life situation: 1) Perceived stress (PSS-10; Cohen and Williamson, 1988); 2) Warwick-Edinburgh mental well-being scale (Stewart-Brown et al., 2009; Tennant et al., 2007); 3) Symptoms checklist (SCL-10; Strand et al., 2003).
Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Mechanisms
(1) Self efficacy (Gaumer Erickson et al., 2016)
(2) Stress mindset (Yeager et al., 2021)
(3) Procrastination (IPS; Steel, 2002 & 2010; translation to Norwegian by Svartdal, 2015)

Treatment Fidelity
(1) Fixed mindset scale (Yeager, 2016)
(2) Stress manipulation test (Yeager et al., 2021)

Other outcomes
(1) Locus of control (Pearlin and Schooler, 1978)
(2) Knows future career (Resnjanskij et al., 2021).
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
All youths registered at the Norwegian public Follow-up Service will be invited to participate. The Follow-up Service in Norway supports young people up to the age of 24 who are entitled to upper secondary education but are not currently in school, training, or regular employment. They reach out to those who have not applied for education, have left education or training, or have lost their entitlement to it, helping them find suitable educational, training, or job opportunities.
Upon providing consent and logging into the web application, participants will complete a baseline survey. Following this, they will receive weekly content through the web platform. The participants will receive an SMS each week for five consecutive weeks, with a note that a new session in the app is available. There will also be reminders to complete the content in each session.

Experimental Design Details
Not available
Randomization Method
Randomization happens individually and is automated in the app at the individual level.
Randomization Unit
We randomize at the individual level with equal probability of each treatment.
Was the treatment clustered?
No

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
2000 individuals
Sample size: planned number of observations
We invite all youths aged 16-25 who are registered with the Norwegian public Follow-up Service and are not currently in a program involving full-time education, employment, or job training. This will give us a sample size of about 10.500 youth. We will have a first-serve policy up until at least 2000 youths have consented to participate.
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
We will have 1000 in treatment and 1000 in control.
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
We calculate the MDES using Optimal Design Software (Spybrooke et al., 2001). We have individual-level randomization and a sample of 2,000 youths who have signed up to participate. This sample is equally split between treatment and control. Assuming 80 percent power and a two-sided 95-percent confidence interval, we have a Minimum Detectable Effect Size (MDES) of 0.13 standard deviations, not including any control variables. If we assume that control variables explain 20% of the variation in the outcome variables (R^2=0.2), the MDES reduces to 0.11 standard deviations. If we assume an R^2 as high as 0.8 (as we observe baseline values of most of our outcome variables), it would go down to 0.06 standard deviations. Adding data from the first field implementation may give us even more precision.
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
NSD Data Protection Official for Research
IRB Approval Date
2024-09-10
IRB Approval Number
353487