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Evaluation of a school-based gender sensitization campaign in India

Last registered on March 18, 2017

Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Evaluation of a school-based gender sensitization campaign in India
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0000072
Initial registration date
February 26, 2014

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
February 26, 2014, 3:26 PM EST

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

Last updated
March 18, 2017, 6:56 PM EDT

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

Locations

Region

Primary Investigator

Affiliation
Northwestern University

Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Affiliation
PI Affiliation
J-PAL South Asia at IFMR

Additional Trial Information

Status
On going
Start date
2013-08-17
End date
2018-04-14
Secondary IDs
Abstract
This study uses a randomized controlled trial design to evaluate a school-based awareness and mobilization pilot program aimed at promoting gender equality and tackling the problem of son preference in India. The intervention, led by a human rights NGO, Breakthrough, will be conducted for two school years (2014-2016) in secondary schools in 150 villages in Haryana, the state with the lowest child sex ratio in India. The villages will be spread across four districts in Haryana: Rohtak, Sonepat, Panepat, and Jhajjar. The program will target female and male students enrolled in Classes 7-9.

The study will measure whether the intervention is successful in improving youth attitudes toward gender equality and decreasing support for sex-selective abortion. The study will also measure spillover effects on the attitudes of participants’ siblings as well as differences in program impact by gender and family backgrounds of participants. The program’s impacts on gender attitudes are expected to, in turn, change the participants' behavior, e.g., make them less likely to engage in and condone sex-selective abortion, when they start families. The study is designed so that in follow-up work, the impact of the program on fertility behavior and on the sex ratio of participants’ children can be estimated.

The study sample comprise two groups: secondary schools in 150 villages which receive the Breakthrough intervention and an additional secondary schools in 164 control villages in the same 4 districts. A baseline survey of randomly selected students and a subset of students' parents will be conducted prior to program roll-out. An endline survey will be conducted after the program has been implemented for two years.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Dhar, Diva, Tarun Jain and Seema Jayachandran. 2017. "Evaluation of a school-based gender sensitization campaign in India." AEA RCT Registry. March 18. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.72-8.0
Former Citation
Dhar, Diva, Tarun Jain and Seema Jayachandran. 2017. "Evaluation of a school-based gender sensitization campaign in India." AEA RCT Registry. March 18. https://www.socialscienceregistry.org/trials/72/history/15176
Sponsors & Partners

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Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
The intervention is designed and implemented by the NGO, Breakthrough, and is comprised of programming for both secondary-school students and teachers. More specifically, the intervention includes capacity-building of teachers to educate youth on gender inequality; establishment of Breakthrough youth clubs in schools; writing activities and school debates on gender topics; awareness-building events in schools such as plays, poster competitions, and fairs; and an innovative media and communications campaign with print, audio-visual and digital media. It will be administered over two years in secondary schools in 150 randomly selected villages across the four districts of Rohtak, Sonepat, Panepat, and Jhajjar in the state of Haryana. The program will target female and male students enrolled in Classes 7-9.
Intervention Start Date
2014-04-01
Intervention End Date
2016-04-30

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
gender attitudes, gender-related behaviors, education outcomes, marriage and fertility outcomes
Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
In Haryana, India, secondary schools in 314 villages will be randomly assigned to either receive a gender sensitization and mobilization intervention or be in the control group and receive no intervention. Prior to the intervention launch, a baseline survey will be administered to randomly selected students and a subset of students' parents. Surveys for students will include an interview component with a surveyor as well as a computer-administered implicit association test. Endline data collection will be conducted for both students and their similarly-aged siblings after the intervention has been implemented for two years.
Experimental Design Details
Not available
Randomization Method
By a computer
Randomization Unit
Villages
Was the treatment clustered?
Yes

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
314 villages
Sample size: planned number of observations
14,855 students and 6,145 parents
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
150 villages treatment, 164 villages control
(Secondary schools in 150 villages will be in the treatment group and receive the Breakthrough intervention. Secondary schools in 164 villages will be in the control group)
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
Northwestern University Institutional Review Board
IRB Approval Date
2013-07-24
IRB Approval Number
STU00081053
IRB Name
Institute for Financial Management and Research Human Subjects Committee
IRB Approval Date
2013-06-26
IRB Approval Number
IRB00007107
Analysis Plan

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