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Browse news articles about J-PAL and our affiliated professors, and read our press releases and monthly global and research newsletters. For media inquiries, please email us.

The Impact of Secondary Education on Economic Decision-Making in Malawi

Syngjoo Choi
Hyuncheol Bryant Kim
Booyuel Kim
Researchers evaluated whether randomly providing financial support for secondary education could improve economic decision-making in addition to educational outcomes for secondary school students in Malawi. Results show that the intervention improved educational outcomes and economic decision-making...

Credit, Change, and Lost Sales: A Field Experiment Among Firms in Kenya

Researchers in Kenya issued a questionnaire to firms which may have made lost sales and profits due to poor change management became more salient. A second intervention more explicitly emphasized the costs of having insufficient change. Highlighting the importance of carrying correct change helped...

Increasing Mobile Banking Use Among Rural Populations in Ghana

Researchers assessed the impact of financial incentives and peer endorsement on mobile banking adoption and formal savings in Ghana. While financial incentives boosted adoption by 50 percent, peer endorsement was twice as effective, leading to sustained mobile banking use and a 30 percent increase...

The Role of Mobile Banking in Expanding Trade Credit and Business Development in Kenya

Trade credit, which is usually provided by up-stream suppliers to down-stream firms, can help small businesses to purchase non-perishable goods for resale and free up resources for other uses. However, provision of trade credit may be limited by high transaction costs, up-stream liquidity...

Building Preschools to Improve Child Development and Mothers' Agency in Morocco

Researchers are conducting a randomized evaluation to measure a major preschool construction program underway in Morocco.

The Impact of Role Models and Technical Assistance on Microfirms in Chile

In partnership with Simón de Cirene, a Chilean non-profit organization, researchers evaluated the impact of providing role models and personalized assistance through various delivery methods on the business outcomes of micro-entrepreneurs. One year after the program ended, household income increased...

The Effectiveness of Encouraging Voter Participation by Inducing Feelings of Pride or Shame

Tiffany C. Davenport
Christopher Larimer
Christopher B. Mann
Costas Panagopoulos
Researchers evaluated whether disclosure of past voting participation had a stronger impact on turnout when it reminded voters of instances in which they previously voted or of instances in which they failed to vote. The results suggest that mailings disclosing past voting behavior had strong...