Public Prediction Bulletin

Abstract

This survey collects forecasts from experts, development practitioners and academics regarding the impacts of three different teacher training programs in El Salvador. This survey consists of three sections: First, we will explain the program and the context of the study. Second, you can provide your predictions regarding the impact of the program. Third, we are interested in your background and would like to collect basic demographic and professional information.

Study ID sspp-2025-0002-v1
Authors Konstantin Büchel, Carla Coccia, Martina Jakob, Ben Jann
Discipline Economics
Field Development Economics
Completion Time 10 Minutes
Close Date (UTC) April 1, 2025


Citation
Büchel, Konstantin, Coccia, Carla, Jakob, Martina, and Ben Jann. 2025. "Improving the Quality of Education in Developing Countries: An Experimental Evaluation of Teacher Training Programs in El Salvador." Social Science Prediction Platform. January 30. https://socialscienceprediction.org/s/efyx68



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Abstract

The regular provision of unconditional cash transfers to individuals is a tactic to fight poverty that has attracted significant interest from researchers and policymakers. Despite this interest, many fundamental questions about the effects of receiving sustained unconditional cash transfers remain. 1. The Chicago Resilient Communities Pilot will provide 5,000 participants with $500 per month for one year. A control group of approximately 7,000 individuals will serve as the comparison group. 2. The Cook County Promise Guaranteed Income Pilot will provide 3,250 participants with $500 per month for two years. A control group of approximately 8,940 individuals will serve as the comparison group. The study offers an opportunity to inform both the debate over unconditional cash assistance and other questions about the effects of income that typically elude causal identification.

Study ID sspp-2024-0031-v1
Authors Nour Abdul-Razzak, Alex Bartik, Sarah Miller, Elizabeth Rhodes, Eva Vivalt
Discipline Economics
Field Economics Of Education, Health Economics, Labor Economics, Political Economics, Behavioral Economics
Completion Time 20 Minutes
Close Date (UTC) April 1, 2025


Citation
Abdul-Razzak, Nour, Bartik, Alex, Miller, Sarah, Rhodes, Elizabeth, and Eva Vivalt. 2024. "Unconditional cash transfers in Chicago and Cook County." Social Science Prediction Platform. September 25. https://socialscienceprediction.org/s/22zc64

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Incentive Details

Incentive Type Based on forecast accuracy
Calculation Method Continuous: Based on quadratic forecast accuracy (quadratic scoring rule)
Recipient Pool Everyone receives the incentives


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Abstract

The study examines cognitive performance of individuals in the long-run and intergenerationally. We utilize the Kenya Life Panel Survey (KLPS), a longitudinal study tracking over 7,000 individuals who attended primary school in Kenya. Individuals were sampled in 1998 for participation in schooling interventions, and have been tracked continuously since then in five survey rounds spanning 25 years. The first goal of the analysis is to estimate the correlation in individual cognitive performance over long periods of time. We utilize cognitive data collected when individuals were children and also when they were in middle-age. Specifically, in 2000 when the respondents were in early adolescence (age range 12 to 15), detailed data was collected in several different cognitive tests. The same cognitive tests were then collected in 2023 when respondents ranged in age from 35 to 38. We estimate the correlation between cognitive tests scores on each of the tests 23 years apart. The second goal is to estimate intergenerational correlations of cognitive scores. The most recent KLPS survey round (Round 5) also collected (in 2024-25) the same cognitive assessments with a randomly selected sample of children of the KLPS respondents, who range in age from 10 to 13, overlapping with the age at which their parents were tested decades earlier. This allows us to estimate the correlation between cognitive scores of parents and their children, where we are interested both in the correlation of parents’ current score (in 2023) with their children’s scores, as well as the correlation of the parents’ 2000 scores with their children.

Study ID sspp-2025-0001-v1
Authors Edward Miguel, Michael Walker, Uyanga Byambaa (+ others)
Discipline Economics
Field Development Economics, Economics Of Education
Completion Time 10 Minutes
Close Date (UTC) March 31, 2025


Citation
Miguel, Edward, Walker, Michael, and Uyanga Byambaa (+ others). 2025. "Linking childhood to midlife and intergenerational cognitive development: Evidence from the Kenya Life Panel Survey." Social Science Prediction Platform. January 24. https://socialscienceprediction.org/s/4ee46z



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Abstract

Concerns about the negative impacts of smartphones and social media have risen alongside their surging use in developing countries. One potential solution is educational interventions to encourage users to optimize their interactions with digital technologies. We co-created a multi-week, evidence-based digital empowerment curriculum designed to expand students’ ability to exert deliberate control over their use of social media and smartphones. We implement this curriculum with college students in India as a classroom-based course and as a text message-based course. Using a randomized controlled trial, we evaluate both versions of the curriculum and estimate the effects of exposure to the curriculum on social media consumption, mental health, misinformation discernment, sleep and concentration, and academic outcomes.

Study ID sspp-2024-0046-v1
Authors Mridul Joshi, Jalnidh Kaur, Lena Song
Discipline Economics
Field Development Economics, Experimental Economics, Behavioral Economics
Completion Time 10 Minutes
Close Date (UTC) March 31, 2025


Citation
Joshi, Mridul, Kaur, Jalnidh, and Lena Song. 2024. "Evaluating a Digital Empowerment Curriculum for College Students in India." Social Science Prediction Platform. December 31. https://socialscienceprediction.org/s/fyxxxe



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Abstract

"One-time fiscal events" (OTFEs) refer to policies and events that, ipso facto, occur only once with no de jure periodicity. We observe these kinds of events around the world with considerable frequency: for example, capital levies constitute one-time taxes on wealth; other events include corporate windfall taxes, tax amnesties, debt forgiveness, etc. Yet, little is known about the implications of such events for economic behavior and tax revenue. However, one of the central limitations of these policies lies in the critique that, in response to an OTFE, economic agents may update on the likelihood of such ``one-time'' events occurring again in the future. Behavioral distortions---e.g., to investment, labor supply decisions, etc.---may manifest through these updated beliefs. In other words, OTFEs may lead to subsequent deadweight loss. In this project, we develop a methodology for quantifying the behavioral impacts of OTFEs and apply the methodology in a controlled online experiment. This online experiment forms part of a larger project in which we implement our methodology at-scale in a tax randomized controlled trial in coordination with the provincial government of Kasai-Central in the DR Congo. In broad, the methodology incorporates belief elicitation of agents around the implementation of OTFEs (agents' subjective probabilities of repeated events and their expected fiscal environments) in order to decompose behavioral responses between changes in beliefs and underlying behavioral elasticities. We first evaluate our methodology in the context of an online experiment in which workers repeatedly decide how much labor to supply; their labor earnings, including past earnings, may be subject to one-time (non-periodic) tax shocks.

Study ID sspp-2024-0043-v1
Authors Augustin Bergeron, Lukas Bolte, Jakob Brounstein
Discipline Economics
Field Applied Econometrics, Labor Economics, Public Economics, Behavioral Economics
Completion Time 15 Minutes
Close Date (UTC) March 25, 2025


Citation
Bergeron, Augustin, Bolte, Lukas, and Jakob Brounstein. 2024. "Predicting behavioral responses to one-time fiscal events." Social Science Prediction Platform. December 20. https://socialscienceprediction.org/s/f8y24b



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