Perceptions on AI in the Italian labor market: evidence from a survey experiment

Last registered on September 19, 2025
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Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Perceptions on AI in the Italian labor market: evidence from a survey experiment
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0016792
Initial registration date
September 17, 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
September 19, 2025, 10:14 AM EDT

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

Locations

Country
Italy
Region

Primary Investigator

Name
Fabio Angei
Affiliation
Università degli Studi di Cagliari
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Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Name
Rinaldo Brau
PI Affiliation
Università degli Studi di Cagliari
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PI Name
Silvia Balia
PI Affiliation
Università degli Studi di Cagliari
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PI Name
Giovanni Sulis
PI Affiliation
Università degli Studi di Cagliari
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Additional Trial Information

Status
In development
Start date
2025-09-18
End date
2026-05-31
Keywords
Electoral, Labor, Welfare
Additional Keywords
Artificial Intelligence, Survey Experiment, Public Policy Support
JEL code(s)
Secondary IDs
Prior work
This trial does not extend or rely on any prior RCTs.
Abstract
This research project aims to investigate what workers think about the impact of AI on the labor market and, in particular, how this impact can shape their preferences for welfare-based policies. We will run an online survey experiment to test how different framings of AI – (i) labour substituting, (ii) labour complementing, (iii) skill upgrading necessity can affect the support for various public policies. After exposure to one of the treatments, respondents state their preferences for a set of labor-market policies, including unemployment income support, job retention schemes, minimum income programs, publicly funded training, and hiring subsidies. Our primary outcomes are a Likert-scale favorability score. Moreover, as a behavioral proxy, we measure respondents' willingness to sign a symbolic petition asking policymakers to regulate the impact of AI.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Angei, Fabio et al. 2025. "Perceptions on AI in the Italian labor market: evidence from a survey experiment." AEA RCT Registry. September 19. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.16792-1.0
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Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
We will conduct an online survey with approximately 2.100 employed individuals, resident in Italy, between 18 and 60 years old (excluding self-employed workers). Participants are recruited by IPSOS, a professional survey provider, via quotas for gender, age, macro region, and education to approximate national representatives within the Italian workers population.
The survey collects information within different modules:
• Socio-demographics
• Preferences about and experiences with Artificial Intelligence (AI) – experimental setting
• Working conditions
• Job meaning and work-life balance
• Mental and physical health indicators
The section “Preferences about and experiences with artificial intelligence (AI) is the experimental part of the survey. In this section, we split our participants into three different treatment groups and a control group. We provide information about the AI and its use at work, as in a classical information survey experiment setting.
Intervention Start Date
2025-09-18
Intervention End Date
2026-05-31

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
• Support for unemployment protection
• Support for job retention tools
• Support for minimum income policies
• Support for publicy-funded worker training
• Support for tax incentives for hiring
Behavioural outcome: agreement with a symbolic petition asking institutions to govern the impact of AI on the labour market.
Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
We are also very interested in the heterogeneity driven by respondents’ socioeconomic and demographic characteristics—such as income, age, gender, education, and employment status—as well as their initial level of AI knowledge recorded in the experimental-setting section. Moreover, we will also characterize our sample according to the perceived usefulness of public intervention, the perceived family-level financial impact of public intervention, and the perceived risk of job loss.
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
We evaluate the causal effect of informational framings about Artificial Intelligence (AI) on workers’ policy preferences using a survey experiment with individual-level randomization. We randomize respondents into three information treatments or a pure control group.
Experimental Design Details
Not available
Randomization Method
The randomization is done in office by our partner IPSOS through their survey platform.
Randomization Unit
Randomization at the individual level.
Was the treatment clustered?
No

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
2.100 individuals.
Sample size: planned number of observations
2.100 individuals.
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
T1: 500 individuals
T2: 500 individuals
T3: 500 individuals
T0 (control): 600 individuals
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
Supporting Documents and Materials
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
Commissione Etica Università degli Studi di Cagliari
IRB Approval Date
2025-07-28
IRB Approval Number
0234435 2025-07-29
Analysis Plan