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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.

Alleviating Loneliness Among Female Migrant Garment Workers in India

Researchers are launching a randomized evaluation to explore the impact of interventions that foster friendships and enhance problem solving skills on the mental health and labor market outcomes of young women working in a garment factory.

Impacts of Nonpartisan Political Information on Electoral Accountability in Mexico

Leveraging the increasingly widespread use of social media, researchers conducted a large-scale randomized evaluation to test the direct and indirect impact on electoral accountability of a nonpartisan information campaign delivered via Facebook ads during the 2018 Mexican municipal elections...

School Meals, Educational Achievement and School Finance in Kenya

Christel Vermeersch
Researchers examined the effects of subsidized school meals on school participation, educational achievement, and school finance in Western Kenya. The results suggest that the meals program led to improved school participation, as well as higher curriculum test scores, but only in schools where the...

Interest Rate Sensitivity Among Village Banking Clients in Mexico

Researchers measured the impact of different interest rates loan take-up, amount, and repayment rates among female clients of Compartamos Banco in Mexico. Lower interest rates led to an increase in the number of loans issued, loan amounts, and new borrowers but did not increase profits in the short...

Savings Account Labeling and Financial Literacy Training for Susu Customers

In this evaluation, researchers seek to understand if a purely psychological savings product, which encourages customers to earmark account funds for a specific financial goal, increases savings rates. Preliminary results found that customers with a labeled Susu savings account have more total...

Targeting Central Lead Farmers to Boost Agricultural Technology Adoption in Malawi

Researchers conducted a randomized evaluation to test whether the position of a trained lead farmer within a community’s social network affected other farmers’ decisions to adopt a new agricultural technology in Malawi. Results suggest that having access to multiple lead farmers/central individuals...

The Role of Information and Preferences in School Choices in Romania

Robert Ainsworth
Rajeev Dehejia
In this randomized evaluation in Romania, researchers compared the roles of preferences and information in households’ decision-making, with regard to high school selection. Results suggest that households provided with information on school quality tend to choose schools that have a greater...