What do External and Internal Corporate Social Responsibility do? Evidence from a Firm-level Field Experiment

Last registered on June 03, 2020

Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
What do External and Internal Corporate Social Responsibility do? Evidence from a Firm-level Field Experiment
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0005959
Initial registration date
June 03, 2020

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
June 03, 2020, 10:16 AM EDT

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

Locations

Region

Primary Investigator

Affiliation
Washington University in St. Louis Olin Business School

Other Primary Investigator(s)

Additional Trial Information

Status
On going
Start date
2020-04-01
End date
2021-02-01
Secondary IDs
Abstract
This study provides answers to two research questions. First, what are the impacts of corporate social responsibility (CSR) messages on employee attrition, productivity, and well-being? Second, we compare two types of CSR information-external CSR and internal CSR- to examine which type of CSR is more effective.

We conduct a 3-month field experiment on more than 8,000 workers in 145 stores of a large multi-national spa chain home-based in China. The spa worker's job is physically exhausting. Workers have long working hours and the attrition rate is very high. Thus, the strategic provision of corporate social responsibility messages could be an effective managerial practice to improve employee attrition, productivity, and worker well-being.

We assign stores into two treatment groups and one control group. In both treatment groups, workers receive a corporate social responsibility message every other day through the company's information system. Our first treatment, labeled as "external CSR", is to send workers information about the firm's external CSR events in history. Examples include but are unlimited to the firm's subsidizing the socially disadvantaged groups, building schools, and donating during natural disasters. Our second treatment, labeled as "internal CSR", is to provide employees with information on the firm's internal CSR events, for example, setting up relief funding, providing resources for, and helping out its own workers during difficult times. The difference between the two treatments is that external CSR is not directed related to worker's welfare, while internal CSR is closely related.

The field experiment starts on June 1st, 2020, and lasts 14 weeks (3 months).
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Wu, Hugh Xiaolong. 2020. "What do External and Internal Corporate Social Responsibility do? Evidence from a Firm-level Field Experiment." AEA RCT Registry. June 03. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.5959-1.0
Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
We provide workers with two types of corporate social responsibility messages (external and internal CSR) every other day.
Intervention Start Date
2020-06-01
Intervention End Date
2020-09-01

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
Personnel Turnover
Employee productivity (sales, repeated customer, compensation, attendance, etc.)
Store-level performances (e.g. revenues, customer visits)
Employee well-being
Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Pro-social behavior (this outcome is for another separate study, measured by sales one helps coworkers achieve)
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
We assign stores into two treatment groups and one control group. In both treatment groups, workers receive a corporate social responsibility message every other day through the company's information system. Our first treatment, labeled as "external CSR", is to send workers information about the firm's external CSR events in history. Examples include but are unlimited to the firm's subsidizing the socially disadvantaged groups, building schools, and donating during natural disasters. Our second treatment, labeled as "internal CSR", is to provide employees with information on the firm's internal CSR events, for example, setting up relief funding, providing resources for, and helping out its own workers during difficult times. The difference between the two treatments is that external CSR is not directed related to worker's welfare, while internal CSR is closely related.
Experimental Design Details
Randomization Method
Randomization was done in office by a computer: We select employees into treatments or control groups by store using the stratified randomization method. In addition to the average attrition rate (store-level), we stratify on store sales and size, since these characteristics are correlated with turnovers, productivity, and well-being.
Randomization Unit
Store
Was the treatment clustered?
Yes

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
145 stores
Sample size: planned number of observations
8,000 workers
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
48-49 stores per arm
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
Stanford University Research Compliance Office
IRB Approval Date
2020-06-01
IRB Approval Number
waived by IRB

Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

Study Withdrawal

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Intervention

Is the intervention completed?
No
Data Collection Complete
Data Publication

Data Publication

Is public data available?
No

Program Files

Program Files
Reports, Papers & Other Materials

Relevant Paper(s)

Reports & Other Materials