Economic Literacy, Salience of Tradeoffs, and Preferences for Economic Policies: Evidence from a Survey Experiment

Last registered on December 03, 2024
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Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Economic Literacy, Salience of Tradeoffs, and Preferences for Economic Policies: Evidence from a Survey Experiment
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0014896
Initial registration date
November 25, 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
December 03, 2024, 1:26 PM EST

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
Raphael Brade
Affiliation
ifo Institute
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Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Name
Henning Hermes
PI Affiliation
ifo Institute
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PI Name
Tim Kaiser
PI Affiliation
University of Kaiserslautern-Landau
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PI Name
Sarah Necker
PI Affiliation
ifo Institute
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PI Name
Anke Windisch
PI Affiliation
ifo Institute
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PI Name
Ludger Woessmann
PI Affiliation
ifo Institute
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Additional Trial Information

Status
In development
Start date
2024-11-26
End date
2026-06-30
Keywords
Education, Electoral
Additional Keywords
Economic Literacy, Policy Preferences, Survey Experiment, Information Provision
JEL code(s)
Secondary IDs
Prior work
This trial does not extend or rely on any prior RCTs.
Abstract
We plan to conduct a representative survey, including survey experiments, with a sample of approximately 2,500 German adults. Our aims are to
a) administer a newly developed measurement battery for economic literacy and use psychometric techniques to derive a measure of economic literacy.
b) investigate the association of the measure with various background characteristics, including socio-demographic characteristics, measures of economic preferences, financial literacy, intelligence, and background in economics education
c) investigate the measure's association with individuals' economic values, policy preferences, and economic expectations.

Using survey experiments and our measure of economic literacy to generate subgroups of participants with high and low economic literacy, we aim to address the following specific research questions:
i) Does information about the tradeoffs associated with economic policies have a causal effect on policy preferences among individuals with low and high economic literacy?
ii) Does the effect of information about tradeoffs differ between individuals with low and high economic literacy?
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Brade, Raphael et al. 2024. "Economic Literacy, Salience of Tradeoffs, and Preferences for Economic Policies: Evidence from a Survey Experiment." AEA RCT Registry. December 03. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.14896-1.0
Sponsors & Partners
Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
For four policy statements, participants are randomly assigned to either a control group, in which they are asked whether they agree with the policy statement without receiving any additional information, or a treatment group, in which they are asked whether they agree with the policy statement and in which they receive additional information about potential tradeoffs associated with the policy.
Intervention Start Date
2024-11-26
Intervention End Date
2025-01-19

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
Our primary outcome of interest is individuals' agreement with the policy statements.
Primary Outcomes (explanation)
See experimental design section.

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Heterogeneity by level of economic literacy.
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)
The questionnaire includes a newly developed economic literacy measurement battery that we will use to categorize our respondents into low and high economic literacy subgroups.

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
We are conducting the survey experiment with a sample of approximately 2,500 adults. The survey is conducted in partnership with a survey company, who manages the recruitment of participants. The survey itself is administered through Qualtrics, and participants answer questions autonomously on their own digital devices. Randomization is performed by Qualtrics.

The experimental design is as follows. Subjects are asked how much they agree with four policy statements (response categories: strongly agree; somewhat agree; neither agree nor disagree; somewhat disagree; strongly disagree). Whether subjects are presented with the control or treatment statement is randomized independently for each statement.
Experimental Design Details
Not available
Randomization Method
Randomization is carried out by the randomizer of Qualtrics.
Randomization Unit
Individual level
Was the treatment clustered?
No

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
2,500 individuals
Sample size: planned number of observations
2,500 individuals
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
For each of the four statements, approximately 1,250 survey participants will be assigned to the treatment statement.
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 Faculty of Economics at the University of Munich (LMU)
IRB Approval Date
2024-10-24
IRB Approval Number
2024-16
Analysis Plan