| Field | Before | After |
|---|---|---|
| Field Abstract | Before In this project we test whether messages that (a) show that many people have taken an action, (b) make a person feel important to reaching a goal, and (c) the combination of the two can cause people to take an action. We use a series of three field experiments with over thirty-four-thousand subjects. Two of these field experiments randomize messages sent in the charitable giving setting to see the effects of being made to feel important and the popularity of an action on donation rates. The final field experiment looks at the effects of these same types of messages on voter turnout rates in a university election. | After In this project we test whether messages that (a) show that many people have taken an action, (b) make a person feel important to reaching a goal, and (c) the combination of the two can cause people to take an action. We use a series of three field experiments with over thirty-four-thousand subjects. Two of these field experiments randomize messages sent in the charitable giving setting to see the effects of being made to feel important and the popularity of an action on donation rates. The final field experiment looks at the effects of these same types of messages on voter turnout rates in a university election. |
| Field Last Published | Before October 25, 2023 10:32 AM | After April 24, 2024 04:52 PM |
| Field | Before | After |
|---|---|---|
| Field Paper Abstract | Before | After We examine the combined effects of popularity and feelings of being important to reaching a goal by testing how people react to (1) situations in which their own behavior is pivotal or not, as well as (2) the popularity of the action. We conduct a laboratory experiment to cleanly fix beliefs about the person's likelihood of being pivotal in reaching a donation threshold that triggers a matching gift, varying both the pivotality and the number of other donors (popularity). The results are striking in that a person whose action is pivotal is more than twice as likely to make a donation, an increase of approximately 30 percentage points. Popularity, in contrast, is not influential. To test these findings in a more natural setting, we conduct two field experiments, neither of which demonstrates meaningful effects. Our results suggest that pivotality is a more important determinant of prosocial behavior, but that it can be a challenge to leverage this finding to meaningfully improve outcomes in the field. |
| Field Paper Citation | Before | After Gee, Laura K., et al. "Pivotal or popular: The effects of social information and feeling pivotal on civic actions." Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization 219 (2024): 404-413. |
| Field Paper URL | Before | After https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jebo.2023.12.016 |