AEA Papers and Proceedings
ISSN 2574-0768 (Print) | ISSN 2574-0776 (Online)
Is More Better? Evaluating Interventions to Increase Female Students’ Interest in Economics
AEA Papers and Proceedings
(pp. 692–696)
Abstract
We implement a two-year randomized controlled trial in an introductory economics course at a liberal arts college to evaluate the impact of combining easy-to-implement interventions on students’ likelihood of taking additional economics courses. Interventions include a welcome email, gender-composition-manipulated required study groups, and an end-of-semester congratulatory email to students with median grades or higher. We find that any one intervention increases the probability that women, but not men, take additional economics courses, but more interventions do not increase effectiveness for individual students. However, heterogeneous effects imply that multiple interventions will be more effective when implemented for a group of students.Citation
Owen, Ann L., Evelyn Skoy, and Wei Zhan. 2026. "Is More Better? Evaluating Interventions to Increase Female Students’ Interest in Economics." AEA Papers and Proceedings 116: 692–696. DOI: 10.1257/pandp.20261058Additional Materials
JEL Classification
- A22 Economic Education and Teaching of Economics: Undergraduate
- I23 Higher Education; Research Institutions
- I28 Education: Government Policy
- J16 Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination