Journal Article

Fostering patience in the classroom: results from randomized educational intervention

Authors

Publication date

Oct 2018

Summary

We evaluate the impact of a randomized educational intervention on children’s intertemporal choices. The intervention aims to improve the ability to imagine future selves and encourages forward-looking behavior using a structured curriculum delivered by children’s own trained teachers. We find that treated students make more patient intertemporal decisions in incentivized experimental tasks. The results persist almost 3 years after the intervention, replicate well in a different sample, and are robust across different experimental elicitation methods. The effects also extend beyond experimental outcomes: we find that treated students are significantly less likely to receive a low “behavior grade.”

Published in

Journal of Political Economy

Volume and page numbers

126 , 1865 -1911

DOI

https://dx.doi.org/10.1086/699007

Links

University of Essex, Albert Sloman Library Periodicals *restricted to University of Essex registered users* - http://serlib0.essex.ac.uk/record=b1599760~S5

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