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How does relative performance feedback affect beliefs and academic decisions?

Catalina Franco

Published 2020 in AEA Randomized Controlled Trials

ABSTRACT

I report on a field and lab-in-the-field experiments examining how students’ beliefs, academic investments, performance, and the decision to take a college entrance exam change when students of different ability levels learn about their relative performance. In the context of a 3-month preparation course for a high-stakes college entrance exam, I elicit beliefs from all students and randomly assign them either to receive or not to receive feedback about their quartile in the score distribution in weekly practice tests. Combining elicited beliefs and administrative data, I present three main findings. First, relative performance feedback affects almost exclusively low-performing students, who become discouraged by this intervention. Compared to low-performing students who do not get relative feedback, they take fewer practice tests, get lower scores, and are less likely to take the college entrance exam they are preparing for. Second, low-performing female and male students respond in different ways, with males reducing investments and females keeping effort up but deciding to not take the college entrance exam. Third, even though low performers change behavior, they do not update beliefs in the incentivized task, suggesting potential discrepancies between elicited and true beliefs. Overall, my results shed light on the potential discouragement effects of informational interventions on students with low academic performance.

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