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Social preferences and refugee integration in Jordan

Last registered on July 14, 2021

Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Social preferences and refugee integration in Jordan
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0004063
Initial registration date
March 31, 2019

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
March 31, 2019, 11:24 PM EDT

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

Last updated
July 14, 2021, 10:45 AM EDT

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

Locations

Region

Primary Investigator

Affiliation
Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods

Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Affiliation
WZB
PI Affiliation
Max-Planck-Institute for Research on Collective Goods
PI Affiliation
WZB

Additional Trial Information

Status
Completed
Start date
2019-03-17
End date
2021-06-23
Secondary IDs
Abstract
In this project, we study the integration of refugee children into Jordanian society, both from the perspective of Jordanian children, and from the perspective of the Syrian refugee children. In particular, we measure discrimination, or each child’s preference for sharing with their “in-group” vis-à-vis their “out-group” to assess how well Syrian refugee children are being integrated into Jordanian society, with the education system forming an integral part of this integration. Secondly, we investigate whether a (Syrian) refugee child whose family has spent longer in Jordan will behave differently towards Jordanian children (relative to Syrian children), in comparison to a (Syrian) refugee child whose family has arrived in Jordan more recently. This speaks to the “contact hypothesis” literature. Thirdly, we study the role of narratives that may influence a child's level of discrimination by pointing participants to the fact that Syrians are mainly refugees in Jordan. We also investigate if parents' attitudes towards refugees are correlated with the choices of their children.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Barron, Kai et al. 2021. "Social preferences and refugee integration in Jordan." AEA RCT Registry. July 14. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.4063-2.0
Former Citation
Barron, Kai et al. 2021. "Social preferences and refugee integration in Jordan." AEA RCT Registry. July 14. https://www.socialscienceregistry.org/trials/4063/history/198839
Sponsors & Partners

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Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
Intervention Start Date
2019-03-31
Intervention End Date
2019-04-04

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
-First party sharing / dictator game, self vs. in-group: Allocation of endowment to participant
-First party sharing / dictator game, self vs. out-group: Allocation of endowment to participant
-Third party sharing / dictator game, in-group vs. out-group: Allocation of endowment to in-group
-Grit game: Choice of grid in first round, choice of grid in second round, quantity of number pairs found the first and second round match-pair game, success or failure in each round
Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
-Difference in allocation to self when playing with partner from out-group versus when playing with partner from the in-group
-A suitable aggregation of the endowment to in-group (primary results) and the above explained difference in allocation (on the individual level) to measure discrimination
-Attitudes of Parents
-Time spent in Jordan
-Number of Syrian/Jordanian friends
-Migration History
-Similarity to out-/in-group
-Plans to integrate
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)
-Individual level discrimination: Average number of tokens allocated to the in-group in surplus to the tokens allocated to the out-group in first and third party dictator game
-Attitudes of Parents: We ask for the level of agreement to several statements about Syrian refugees and how their influx has affected Jordan. The answers will be suitably aggregated, potentially using weights of a PCA
-Time spent in Jordan: We ask parents when they came to Jordan, if they are Syrian
-Number of Syrian/Jordanian friends: We ask children how many friends they have that are Jordanian and Syrian, and how many of those are in their school
-Migration History: If family is Jordanian, we ask whether they have Palastinian roots, thus might feel more empathy for refugees
-Similarity to out-/in-group: Having relatives from the out-group or having lived close to the border (if Syrian) might indicate a closer similarity to the out-group
-Plans to integrate: If Syrian, we ask whether the family has plans to return to Syria, which might be indicative for their integration effort

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
We play a first and third party sharing game and a grit game with participants. In the sharing game, we vary the identity of the recipient (in-group vs out-group; salient vs non-salient). In the grit game, we vary the recipient of the earned rewards.
Experimental Design Details
We play two first party sharing games (we prefer to use the name "sharing game" to the commonly used "dictator game"), where we vary the group membership of the recipient. Subsequently, participants play a third party sharing game where they are asked to allocate the endowment between a partner from the in-group and a partner from their out-group. Finally, participants play a grit game with two rounds, where they are asked twice (before each round) to choose either a small (easier) or a big (harder) grid of numbers, where they have to find 3 matching-number pairs that add up to 20 in order to succeed and get rewarded. In one treatment arm, in the grit game, participants can earn a reward for a partner from their out-group, whereas in the other treatment arm, participants play for the benefit of a partner from the out-group. Additionally, we conduct a survey with parents and children to collect demographic information and to assess parents' attitudes regarding the refugee crisis and its impact on Jordanian's lives. We also collect data on the duration of Syrian's stay in Jordan, and the number of in-group and out-group friends the children have.
Randomization Method
Children are collected from the classroom in groups of four, and are randomly allocated to one of the four treatment tracks. (In each school, there will be four enumerators conducting the experiment in parallel, with one child at a time.)
Randomization Unit
Individual
Was the treatment clustered?
No

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
A maximum of 527 individuals (this number assumes that we are able to interview every single child on our list).
Sample size: planned number of observations
A maximum of 527 individuals
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
Our target sample is comprised of approximately 250 Jordanian and 250 non-Jordanian (mostly Syrian) children. For each group, we have four treatment tracks. The treatment tracks vary on two dimensions for the first party sharing game: (1) whether they play the sharing game with their in-group or out-group first (all subjects do both; it is just the order that is varied), (2) whether the recipient's nationality is made more salient or not. For the first party sharing game, this divides each group of 250 into four groups of approximately 60. All subjects then play the third party sharing game. Thereafter, within each nationality group (Jordanian and non-Jordanian), half of the subjects play the grit game earning gifts for their in-group, and half earn gifts for their out-group. This implies approximately 125 in each group for the grit game.
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
Supporting Documents and Materials

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IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
WZB Ethics Committee
IRB Approval Date
2019-01-22
IRB Approval Number
2019/1/62

Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

Study Withdrawal

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Intervention

Is the intervention completed?
No
Data Collection Complete
Yes
Data Collection Completion Date
May 12, 2019, 12:00 +00:00
Final Sample Size: Number of Clusters (Unit of Randomization)
Does not apply (we did not conduct an RCT)
Was attrition correlated with treatment status?
Final Sample Size: Total Number of Observations
456 pupils
Final Sample Size (or Number of Clusters) by Treatment Arms
Does not apply (we did not conduct an RCT, i.e., no treatment arms)
Data Publication

Data Publication

Is public data available?
Yes

Program Files

Program Files
Yes
Reports, Papers & Other Materials

Relevant Paper(s)

Abstract
We measure the prevalence of discrimination between Jordanian host and Syrian refugee children attending school in Jordan. Using a simple sharing experiment, we find only a small degree of out-group discrimination. However, Jordanian children with Palestinian roots do not discriminate at all, suggesting that a family history of refugee status can generate solidarity with new refugees. We also find that parents’ narratives about the refugee crisis are correlated with their children's degree of out-group discrimination, particularly among Syrian refugee children, suggesting that discriminatory preferences are being transmitted through parental attitudes.
Citation
Kai Barron, Heike Harmgart, Steffen Huck, Sebastian O. Schneider, Matthias Sutter (2023). Discrimination, Narratives, and Family History: An Experiment with Jordanian Host and Syrian Refugee Children. The Review of Economics and Statistics 105 (4): 1008–1016

Reports & Other Materials