Recent research Papers
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Student Evaluations of Teaching (Mostly) Do Not Measure Teaching Effectiveness,
ScienceOpen Research (January, 2016), with Kellie Ottoboni & Philip B. Stark. Gender Biases in Student Evaluations of Teaching, Journal of Public Economics 145 (2017): 27-41. Aspiring Top Civil Servants' Distrust in the Private Sector, Revue d'Economie Politique 128(6)(2018): 1047-1087, with Claudine Desrieux & Romain Espinosa. |
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Work in Progress
Reducing Discrimination in the Field: Evidence from an Awareness Raising Intervention Targeting Gender Biases in Student Evaluations of Teaching, with Arnaud Philippe (under submission).
This paper presents the results of a field experiment designed to reduce gender discrimination in student evaluations of teaching (SET). In the first intervention, students receive a normative statement reminding them that they should not discriminate in SETs. In the second intervention, the normative statement includes precise information about how other students (especially male students) have discriminated against female teachers in previous years. The purely normative statement has no significant impact on SET overall satisfaction scores, suggesting that a blanket awareness-raising campaign may be inefficient to reduce discrimination. However, the informational statement appears to significantly reduce gender discrimination. The effect we find mainly comes from a change in male students’ evaluation of female teachers.
Gender, Competition and Choices in Higher Education (with Jen Brown)
We examine the choices of male and female students in higher education, holding fixed the field of study and accounting for individuals’ underlying academic ability. Examining undergraduate students’ choices in a yearlong, mandatory international exchange program, we find that average- and high-ability female students systematically choose less ambitious paths. On average, male students request universities that are better-ranked than what their true academic standing would suggest, whereas female students request universities that are worse than their academic standing. Using simple simulations, we consider the impact of other allocation rules on students’ assignments for the international exchange year. We find that both male and female students would be better-off on average if female students adopted more competitive behavior. We discuss how students’ experiences in higher education are likely to affect their academic trajectories, career opportunities and future earnings. We also discuss potential explanations for male and female students’ different behaviors.
Student aspirations (with Ghazala Azmat, Sophie Cêtre & Roberto Galbiati)
Women in the economics profession: an analysis using RePEc (with Soledad Zignago and Christian Zimmermann)
This paper presents the results of a field experiment designed to reduce gender discrimination in student evaluations of teaching (SET). In the first intervention, students receive a normative statement reminding them that they should not discriminate in SETs. In the second intervention, the normative statement includes precise information about how other students (especially male students) have discriminated against female teachers in previous years. The purely normative statement has no significant impact on SET overall satisfaction scores, suggesting that a blanket awareness-raising campaign may be inefficient to reduce discrimination. However, the informational statement appears to significantly reduce gender discrimination. The effect we find mainly comes from a change in male students’ evaluation of female teachers.
Gender, Competition and Choices in Higher Education (with Jen Brown)
We examine the choices of male and female students in higher education, holding fixed the field of study and accounting for individuals’ underlying academic ability. Examining undergraduate students’ choices in a yearlong, mandatory international exchange program, we find that average- and high-ability female students systematically choose less ambitious paths. On average, male students request universities that are better-ranked than what their true academic standing would suggest, whereas female students request universities that are worse than their academic standing. Using simple simulations, we consider the impact of other allocation rules on students’ assignments for the international exchange year. We find that both male and female students would be better-off on average if female students adopted more competitive behavior. We discuss how students’ experiences in higher education are likely to affect their academic trajectories, career opportunities and future earnings. We also discuss potential explanations for male and female students’ different behaviors.
Student aspirations (with Ghazala Azmat, Sophie Cêtre & Roberto Galbiati)
Women in the economics profession: an analysis using RePEc (with Soledad Zignago and Christian Zimmermann)
