On 12-13th October 2018, The Centre for Experimental Social Science (CESS) at Nuffield College, Oxford and the Behavioral Science Unit (eMBeD) at the World Bank hosted a workshop on Measuring the Tricky Things at Nuffield College.
The workshop brought together scholars working on state-of-the-art measurement techniques for measuring things that are difficult to measure to share best practice. Speakers presented on studies to elicit attitudes, social norms, cognitive abilities, and behaviours that people prefer to hide, that are prone to social desirability bias, or that people are simply not aware of (e.g., social norms related to domestic violence, stereotypes and out-group biases across hostile groups, and dishonesty).
The workshop had an impressive line-up of speakers presenting their research and innovative measurement approaches. A full list of speakers and their presentation titles can be found below. Links to presentation slides, working papers, and published material have been included where possible.
Susan Fiske – “Measuring Subtle Bias: Ambivalent Stereotypes, Prejudices, and Discrimination” | download paper
Karla Hoff – “Measuring Cultural Influences on Preferences” | download paper
Ryan Enos – “Conservatism and Fairness in Contemporary Politics: Unpacking the Psychological Underpinnings of Modern Racism” | download paper
Rachel Glennerster – “Reducing Social Desirability Bias in Measurement: Practical Tips” | download paper
Varun Gauri – “Measuring Social Norms: Women’s Labor Foce Participation in Jordan”
Julian Jamison – “Item-Count Techniques 2.0” | download paper
Henry Travers – “Using Experimental Methods to Measure Involvement in Illegal Wildlife Trade and Response to Policies” | download paper
Armin Falk – “Reliability and Validity of Non-Cognitive Measures in Household Surveys – Multicountry Evidence Using the BIG-5 Personality Measures” | Global Preferences Survey
Anandi Mani – “Cognitive Droughts”
Sheheryar Banuri – “Encouraging Service Delivery to the Hard-to-Serve: Healthcare Professional, Pecuniary Incentives, and Pro-Poor Motivation” | download paper
CESS would like to thank all speakers for sharing their research and all participants for contributing to lively debates. We thank James Walsh, Blavatnik School of Government and the World Bank’s Behavioural Science Unit eMBeD, and Sonja Vogt, Institute of Sociology at the University of Bern and CESS, for organizing the workshop.
We hope that you have all become a little wiser on how to measure the tricky things.
Below is a gallery from the workshop.
