Role of Beliefs on Study Effort

Stage 1: Participants in Stage 1 are induced to exert different levels of effort depending on their random group assignment.

Stage 2: Participants are randomly assigned in one of the 4 groups: Participants in the control arm do not receive information. Participants in treatment arms are provided with information about the effect of effort on performance for Stage 1 participants. Depending on which treatment arm they are, they get somewhat different information.

Stage 1: Participants in Stage 1 are induced to exert different levels of effort depending on their random group assignment. In particular, participants are randomly allocated to online classrooms with different assignment levels: 8 lessons per week, 12 lessons per week, 16 lessons per week, 20 lessons per week, 24 lessons per week. The participants final payment (which is the same across groups) was tied to their compliance and they knew that their pay will be reduced based on the severity of their non-compliance.

Stage 2: Participants are randomly assigned in one of the 4 groups: Participants in the control arm do not receive information. Participants in treatment arms are provided with information about causal effects of effort on performance for Stage 1 participants. In treatment arm 1, participants receive information about causal effects of completing 32 lessons in a month, 64 lessons in a month, 96 lessons in a month. In treatment arm 2, participants only receive information about a single participant in Stage 1 who has a similar initial score to theirs and who improved little. In treatment arm 3, participants only receive information about a single participant in Stage 1 who has a similar initial score to theirs and who improved a lot.

2017-01-02

2017-08-31

The beliefs about how effort affects performance

How many lessons completed during the study period (effort measure)

Improvement in test scores (Will be measured as the difference between final test score and initial test score)

Stage 1: Measuring the Causal Relationship Between Effort and Performance
In Stage 1, participants first complete an initial survey and take an online assessment test. The main aim of the survey is to collect demographic information about participants. The test assesses their initial level of knowledge of Spanish. Participants then sign up for an online language-learning platform. Participants are randomly allocated to online classrooms with different assignment levels. After studying through the platform as assigned for one month, they take another online test that assesses their final level of knowledge and they answer a short survey about their study behavior.

Stage 2: Eliciting and Changing Beliefs about How Effort Affects Performance
In Stage 2, participants first complete the initial survey and take the online assessment test. They then sign up for the same online language-learning platform. Every week, they complete a survey eliciting their beliefs about the importance of study effort on determining performance. After the first belief elicitation survey, a random subset of the participants receives information regarding the effect of the study effort on performance, which is based on the information collected in Stage 1 whereas the others do not receive such information. Participants in Stage 2 are free to study through the platform as much as they like for one month. At the end of study period, they take the final test and answer a short end survey about their study patterns.

Randomization done in office by a computer using the "https://www.random.org" website.

Randomization unit is the individual.

No

600 participants

600 participants

Stage 1: 150 participants
Effort Group 1: 30
Effort Group 2: 30
Effort Group 3: 30
Effort Group 4: 30
Effort Group 5: 30

Stage 2: 460 participants
No Information: 115
Information Group 1 : 115
Information Group 2: 115
Information Group 3: 115

While distance learning has become widespread, causal estimates regarding returns to effort in technology-assisted learning environments are scarce due to high attrition rates and endogeneity of effort. In this paper, I manipulate effort by randomly assigning students different numbers of lessons in a popular online language learning platform. Using administrative data from the platform and the instrumental variables strategy, I find that completing 9 Duolingo lessons, which corresponds to approximately 60 minutes of studying, leads to a 0.057–0.095 standard deviation increase in test scores. Comparisons to the literature and back-of-the-envelope calculations suggest that distance learning can be as effective as in-person learning for college students for an introductory language course.

Ersoy, F. Returns to effort: experimental evidence from an online language platform. Exp Econ 24, 1047–1073 (2021).

https://doi.org/10.1007/s10683-020-09689-1

How does the perceived relationship between effort and achievement affect effort? To answer this question, I conduct a framed field experiment with a popular online learning platform. I exogenously manipulate students’ beliefs about returns to effort by assigning them to a control group or to treatments which provide information about returns to effort. Students update their beliefs towards the information and change their study effort in the same direction with the shifts in their beliefs. This result shows that low-cost information interventions can influence students’ beliefs about returns to effort and these beliefs are important components of their effort choices.

Fulya Ersoy, Effects of perceived productivity on study effort: Evidence from a field experiment, Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Volume 207, 2023, Pages 376-391.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jebo.2023.01.021.