Job seekers’ beliefs, search behavior, and labor market outcomes: An information experiment

Last registered on July 02, 2025
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Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Job seekers’ beliefs, search behavior, and labor market outcomes: An information experiment
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0015102
Initial registration date
December 31, 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
January 06, 2025, 12:18 PM EST

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

Last updated
July 02, 2025, 11:04 PM EDT

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

Locations

Country
Australia
Region

Primary Investigator

Name
GUGLIELMO BRISCESE
Affiliation
The University of Chicago
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Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Name
Giovanni Topa
PI Affiliation
New York University
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PI Name
Giulio Zanella
PI Affiliation
Università di Bologna
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Additional Trial Information

Status
Completed
Start date
2025-01-06
End date
2025-06-30
Keywords
Behavior, Labor
Additional Keywords
Search and match, structural model, field experiment, labor economics, active labor market policies
JEL code(s)
D91, E03, E24, J3, J31, J42, J6
Secondary IDs
Prior work
This trial does not extend or rely on any prior RCTs.
Abstract
Job seekers’ beliefs about their reemployment prospects likely influence their reemployment outcomes. Overoptimistic individuals may (or may not) exert low job search effort and set high reservation wages, staying unemployed for longer; while pessimistic ones may (or may not) exert high search effort and low reservation wages, settling for low-quality jobs. In this study we aim to experimentally evaluate the impact of an information intervention that corrects job seekers’ possibly biased beliefs on job search behavior and labor market outcomes. We will estimate both a reduced-form causal effect of our treatment on belief updating and job outcomes, as well as identify an equilibrium search model that enables counterfactual policy experiments. Results will contribute to a better understanding of the role of job seekers’ expectations in amplifying labor market frictions, and will help inform the design of scalable, low-cost active labor market policy interventions to improve reemployment outcomes.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
BRISCESE, GUGLIELMO, Giovanni Topa and Giulio Zanella. 2025. "Job seekers’ beliefs, search behavior, and labor market outcomes: An information experiment ." AEA RCT Registry. July 02. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.15102-3.1
Sponsors & Partners
Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
We will elicit prior and posterior beliefs of job seekers, and a random half of respondents will see a belief-correcting information intervention.
Intervention (Hidden)
The intervention consists of a short message displayed to a random half (treated) of job seekers who participate in our survey. The message will be displayed as a survey page before respondents can proceed with the rest of the survey and will show the re-employment rate for job seekers with the same gender, age group, and educational group as them, based on historical administrative data.
Intervention Start Date
2025-01-07
Intervention End Date
2025-05-31

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
- Job finding rates at monthly frequency
- Time until employment
- Hourly wage in first job
- Evolution over time of beliefs about likelihood of finding a job and of the reservation wage, across survey waves.
- Comparison of expected reservation wage after 3 months (elicited in wave 1) and actual reservation wage after 3 months (elicited in wave 3).
- Intended job search effort (time that a job seekers plans to allocate to job search)
- Willingness to watch (and share of video watched, a continuous variable) a video that gives tips on how to create a good resume, i.e., engagement with an existing DEWR resource for job seekers.

Primary Outcomes (explanation)
All outcomes will be tracked via existing administrative data and complemented with survey-based data when tracking changes in beliefs about job prospects.

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
A random half of job seekers will see a belief-correcting information treatment that provides information, based on historical data, about re-employment rates for job seekers of similar demographic characteristics.
Experimental Design Details
All job seekers who enter the unemployment benefits caseload as of the second week of January will be invited to participate in a short online survey. The survey will elicit their prior and posterior beliefs about their job prospects as well as their planned job search activities. A random half of survey respondents will see an additional message that aims to correct any misperceptions about job prospects. The message will show them the actual re-employment rates for job seekers of the same profile as them (i.e., age, gender, education) based on historical data. The survey is longitudinal, consisting of two or three waves (depending on sample size of the first wave) to track how beliefs change over time with and without information interventions. We will link survey data to administrative records to also track actual job finding rates.
Randomization Method
Randomization occurs at the individual job seeker-survey respondent level automatically via Qualtrics embedded randomizer.
Randomization Unit
Individual job seeker level among survey respondents.
Was the treatment clustered?
No

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
0
Sample size: planned number of observations
The study aims to recruit at least 2000 job seekers in the first survey wave.
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
Half of the sample will be automatically allocated to treatment.
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
See attached pre-analysis plan.
Supporting Documents and Materials

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IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
Università di Bologna
IRB Approval Date
2024-02-06
IRB Approval Number
0032016
Analysis Plan

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Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

Study Withdrawal

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Intervention

Is the intervention completed?
No
Data Collection Complete
Data Publication

Data Publication

Is public data available?
No

Program Files

Program Files
Reports, Papers & Other Materials

Relevant Paper(s)

Reports & Other Materials