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Field
Trial Title
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Before
Nudging Citizenship: Evidence from a Field Experiment on Course Evaluations
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After
Nudging Discretionary Contributions: Evidence from a Field Experiment on Course Evaluations
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Field
Abstract
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Before
Many actions in organizations do not directly benefit the individuals who take them, yet they create meaningful value for others or for the organization as a whole. Such behaviors are often described as citizenship behaviors. Despite their importance for learning and improvement, it remains unclear how organizations can encourage individuals to engage in them at scale. We examine this question in the setting of student course evaluations at a major French business school. Completing an evaluation is a voluntary contribution that can support teaching and program improvements. Yet, it offers limited immediate private benefits to the individual student. As a result, participation is often lower than institutions would like, even though evaluations are an important input into improvement processes. Our field experiment is cluster randomized at the student cohort level. Cohorts are defined by program and year, hence all students within a given cohort are selected into the same condition. Our intervention is delivered through the school’s internal platform during the evaluation window. In the control condition, students receive the usual reminder to complete evaluations through the standard notification system. In the first treatment condition, students see a banner that summarizes their own evaluation participation history for the current academic year, making their individual past behavior salient and easy to track. In the second treatment condition, students see course specific information that reports the peer participation rate for each course they are taking, making participation more socially visible in aggregate. Our main outcome is whether students complete course evaluations. We test whether either prompt increases completion relative to business as usual, and whether the two prompts differ in their effects.
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After
Many actions in organizations do not directly benefit the individuals who take them, yet they create meaningful value for others or for the organization as a whole. Such behaviors are often described as discretionary behaviors. Despite their importance for learning and improvement, it remains unclear how organizations can encourage individuals to engage in them at scale. We examine this question in the setting of student course evaluations at a major French business school. Completing an evaluation is a voluntary contribution that can support teaching and program improvements. Yet, it offers limited immediate private benefits to the individual student. As a result, participation is often lower than institutions would like, even though evaluations are an important input into improvement processes. Our field experiment is cluster randomized at the student cohort level. Cohorts are defined by program and year, hence all students within a given cohort are selected into the same condition. Our intervention is delivered through the school’s internal platform during the evaluation window. In the control condition, students receive the usual reminder to complete evaluations through the standard notification system. In the first treatment condition, students see a banner that summarizes their own evaluation participation history for the current academic year, making their individual past behavior salient and easy to track. In the second treatment condition, students see course specific information that reports the peer participation rate for each course they are taking, making participation more socially visible in aggregate. Our main outcome is whether students complete course evaluations. We test whether either prompt increases completion relative to business as usual, and whether the two prompts differ in their effects.
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Field
Last Published
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Before
April 24, 2026 08:09 AM
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After
July 10, 2026 12:15 PM
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Field
Primary Outcomes (End Points)
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Before
Our primary outcome is the number of course evaluations a student completes during the evaluation window. We operationalize this as a student level count variable that sums the evaluations submitted across all courses in which the student is eligible to provide an evaluation within the relevant period.
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After
Our primary outcome is the student-level completion rate, that is, the share of eligible evaluations completed by each student. For each student-course pair, the outcome equals one if the student completes the course evaluation during the relevant evaluation window, and zero otherwise.
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Field
Randomization Method
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Before
Full randomization at the cohort level.
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After
Randomization at the cohort level.
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Field
Secondary Outcomes (End Points)
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Before
We also collect information on the number of course evaluations started (but not finished). Further, we capture average evaluation outcomes for each course.
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After
We further analyze the share of eligible course evaluations completed by the student during the intervention period, an indicator for whether the student completes at least one evaluation, and the total number of evaluations completed. Additionally, we will additionally examine the timing of completion, such as whether evaluations are completed shortly after the intervention becomes visible.
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Field
Pi as first author
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Before
No
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After
Yes
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