Financial Incentives and Dishonesty: An Experiment with Public Health Workers

Last registered on July 13, 2026

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Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title

Financial Incentives and Dishonesty: An Experiment with Public Health Workers

RCT ID

AEARCTR-0018274

Initial registration date

July 07, 2026

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

July 13, 2026, 7:41 AM EDT

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

Muhammad Yasir Khan

Affiliation

University of Pittsburgh

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Other Primary Investigator(s)

Additional Trial Information

Status

On going

Start date

2024-07-23

End date

2026-12-31

Keywords

Health, Labor

Additional Keywords

JEL code(s)

D9, J45, M52, O12

Secondary IDs

Prior work

This trial does not extend or rely on any prior RCTs.

Abstract

This project investigates dishonest behavior of public workers, lady community health workers (LHWs), in which workers lie about having completed their tasks. LHWs are required to make a fixed number of of households within a stipulated time period to deliver public health services and collect data about the health of the community. In this project, we first study if the data collected and reported by workers is truthful and reliable. Second, we elicit time preferences of workers through convex-time-budget method to identify present biased workers. Third, through a randomized control trial, we investigate if truthfulness of the reports submitted by the workers can be increased through providing performance-based incentives that vary with time. Specifically, we randomize workers into three groups: (i) Uniform bonus group receives a piece rate incentive that is constant for any report they submit throughout the study period, (ii) Upfront bonus group receives a piece rate that is 1.5 times the uniform rate for any reported work claimed during the first half of the study period, and 0.5 times the uniform rate for work claimed during the second half, and (iii) a control group that does not receive any performance linked piece rate. We use independent auditors to verify the reports through visiting the households the workers claimed to have visited.

External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation

Khan, Muhammad Yasir. 2026. "Financial Incentives and Dishonesty: An Experiment with Public Health Workers." AEA RCT Registry. July 13. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.18274-1.0

Sponsors & Partners

Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)

The intervention tests if incentives linked to performance can reduce misreporting by workers, and if varying the size of the incentives linked to the timing of the work done matters for this.

Intervention Start Date

2025-10-29

Intervention End Date

2026-12-31

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)

Number of visits.

True Visits.

Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Number of visits: This is based on the data reported by the worker and will be calculated as follows.

a. Number of claimed visits per day: It is calculated per day.

b. Total claimed visit: The total reported visit through the week.

True Visits: This will be measured using household audits conducted by an independent team of auditors. We'll construct two outcomes using the audit data.

Likelihood of any visit being false/true. This will use individual visit dummies as outcomes.

The predicted proportion of total reports that could be true (or false) by extrapolation using the probability of visits being true (or false) times the total number of claimed visits

For each of the above, we also look at it based on the early or later half of the week. For the report level outcomes the number of visits is looked at separately for the first/second half of the work week. Similarly, for audit level outcomes, the probabilities will be calculated using audit data from the first/second half of the work week.

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)

Expand the definition of a report being false.

Days not worked at all

Distance

Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Likelihood of any visit being false, expanded definition. This will use individual visit dummies as outcomes or those that do not exist as they were untraceable by the audit team.

Expanded definition dishonesty: Using the information shared in the full reports, we also mark workers as having dishonestly reported conducting a visit if the reports include duplicate households or households that belong to another geographical area.

Absenteeism as the days of the week when LHW reported no visit based on the LHW reports

The distance travelled by lhw for visits based on the estimated distance of the randomly audited households from the main road as recorded by audit teams.

Experimental Design

In baseline, workers participate in a time preference elicitation experiment using convex time budget in a real effort task. Based on their estimated time preferences (β), workers are classified as present-biased (β<1) and non-present biased (β ≥1).

All health workers conduct their routine household visits and report them for a 6day working week with the date of each visit.

In each treatment condition, LHWs received details about their assigned treatment via a phone call from enumerators two days prior to the start of their reporting week.

Front-load: In this treatment, workers receive a baseline payment of Rs. 200 for participation, and a per-unit payment linked to the number of reported visits with maximum visits to be used for payment capped at 36. The per-unit bonus for visits completed during the first 3 days of the work week was Rs.12.5 per visit and Rs. 4.2 per visit for visits completed during the last 3 days.

Uniform bonus: In this treatment, workers receive baseline payment of Rs. 200 and the constant per-unit payment for their work throughout the workweek. This financial payment will be linked to the number of reported visits, with a uniform per-visit bonus of PKR 8.3 per visit.

Control: In this treatment, workers receive a flat bonus of PKR 500. The workers will be asked to record visits as in other treatment groups.

Experimental Design Details

Not available

Randomization Method

The randomization was done using STATA, balancing on baseline observable characteristics such as workers’ demographics (age, education, tenure, catchment area size), behavioral preferences, and prior productivity.

Randomization Unit

Individual

Was the treatment clustered?