[go: up one dir, main page]

IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/21178.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Thinking, Fast and Slow? Some Field Experiments to Reduce Crime and Dropout in Chicago

Author

Listed:
  • Sara B. Heller
  • Anuj K. Shah
  • Jonathan Guryan
  • Jens Ludwig
  • Sendhil Mullainathan
  • Harold A. Pollack
Abstract
We present the results of three large-scale randomized controlled trials (RCTs) carried out in Chicago, testing interventions to reduce crime and dropout by changing the decision-making of economically disadvantaged youth. We study a program called Becoming a Man (BAM), developed by the non-profit Youth Guidance, in two RCTs implemented in 2009–10 and 2013– 15. In the two studies participation in the program reduced total arrests during the intervention period by 28–35%, reduced violent-crime arrests by 45–50%, improved school engagement, and in the first study where we have follow-up data, increased graduation rates by 12–19%. The third RCT tested a program with partially overlapping components carried out in the Cook County Juvenile Temporary Detention Center (JTDC), which reduced readmission rates to the facility by 21%. These large behavioral responses combined with modest program costs imply benefit-cost ratios for these interventions from 5-to-1 up to 30-to-1 or more. Our data on mechanisms are not ideal, but we find no positive evidence that these effects are due to changes in emotional intelligence or social skills, self-control or “grit,” or a generic mentoring effect. We find suggestive support for the hypothesis that the programs work by helping youth slow down and reflect on whether their automatic thoughts and behaviors are well suited to the situation they are in, or whether the situation could be construed differently.

Suggested Citation

  • Sara B. Heller & Anuj K. Shah & Jonathan Guryan & Jens Ludwig & Sendhil Mullainathan & Harold A. Pollack, 2015. "Thinking, Fast and Slow? Some Field Experiments to Reduce Crime and Dropout in Chicago," NBER Working Papers 21178, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:21178
    Note: CH ED
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w21178.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Anderson, Michael L., 2008. "Multiple Inference and Gender Differences in the Effects of Early Intervention: A Reevaluation of the Abecedarian, Perry Preschool, and Early Training Projects," Journal of the American Statistical Association, American Statistical Association, vol. 103(484), pages 1481-1495.
    2. Howard S. Bloom, 1984. "Accounting for No-Shows in Experimental Evaluation Designs," Evaluation Review, , vol. 8(2), pages 225-246, April.
    3. Sara Heller & Harold A. Pollack & Roseanna Ander & Jens Ludwig, 2013. "Preventing Youth Violence and Dropout: A Randomized Field Experiment," NBER Working Papers 19014, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. A. Colin Cameron & Jonah B. Gelbach & Douglas L. Miller, 2008. "Bootstrap-Based Improvements for Inference with Clustered Errors," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 90(3), pages 414-427, August.
    5. Jeffrey R Kling & Jeffrey B Liebman & Lawrence F Katz, 2007. "Experimental Analysis of Neighborhood Effects," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 75(1), pages 83-119, January.
    6. Jeffrey R. Kling & Jens Ludwig & Lawrence F. Katz, 2005. "Neighborhood Effects on Crime for Female and Male Youth: Evidence from a Randomized Housing Voucher Experiment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 120(1), pages 87-130.
    7. Sendhil Mullainathan & Joshua Schwartzstein & Andrei Shleifer, 2008. "Coarse Thinking and Persuasion," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 123(2), pages 577-619.
    8. Evans, William N. & Owens, Emily G., 2007. "COPS and crime," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(1-2), pages 181-201, February.
    9. Lawrence F. Katz & Jeffrey R. Kling & Jeffrey B. Liebman, 2001. "Moving to Opportunity in Boston: Early Results of a Randomized Mobility Experiment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 116(2), pages 607-654.
    10. David A. Weiner & Byron F. Lutz & Jens Ludwig, 2009. "The Effects of School Desegregation on Crime," NBER Working Papers 15380, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. Yoav Benjamini & Abba M. Krieger & Daniel Yekutieli, 2006. "Adaptive linear step-up procedures that control the false discovery rate," Biometrika, Biometrika Trust, vol. 93(3), pages 491-507, September.
    12. David J. Deming, 2011. "Better Schools, Less Crime?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 126(4), pages 2063-2115.
    13. Lance Lochner & Enrico Moretti, 2004. "The Effect of Education on Crime: Evidence from Prison Inmates, Arrests, and Self-Reports," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(1), pages 155-189, March.
    14. Howard S. Bloom & Larry L. Orr & Stephen H. Bell & George Cave & Fred Doolittle & Winston Lin & Johannes M. Bos, 1997. "The Benefits and Costs of JTPA Title II-A Programs: Key Findings from the National Job Training Partnership Act Study," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 32(3), pages 549-576.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Sara Heller & Harold A. Pollack & Roseanna Ander & Jens Ludwig, 2013. "Preventing Youth Violence and Dropout: A Randomized Field Experiment," NBER Working Papers 19014, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Jonathan M.V. Davis & Sara B. Heller, 2017. "Rethinking the Benefits of Youth Employment Programs: The Heterogeneous Effects of Summer Jobs," NBER Working Papers 23443, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Janet Currie & Michael Mueller-Smith & Maya Rossin-Slater, 2022. "Violence While in Utero: The Impact of Assaults during Pregnancy on Birth Outcomes," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 104(3), pages 525-540, May.
    4. Philip J. Cook & Kenneth Dodge & George Farkas & Roland G. Fryer, Jr & Jonathan Guryan & Jens Ludwig & Susan Mayer & Harold Pollack & Laurence Steinberg, 2014. "The (Surprising) Efficacy of Academic and Behavioral Intervention with Disadvantaged Youth: Results from a Randomized Experiment in Chicago," NBER Working Papers 19862, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Brian Jacob & Max Kapustin & Jens Ludwig, 2014. "Human Capital Effects of Anti-Poverty Programs: Evidence from a Randomized Housing Voucher Lottery," NBER Working Papers 20164, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Sara B. Heller & Brian A. Jacob & Jens Ludwig, 2010. "Family Income, Neighborhood Poverty, and Crime," NBER Chapters, in: Controlling Crime: Strategies and Tradeoffs, pages 419-459, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Kling, Jeffrey R., 2007. "Methodological Frontiers of Public Finance Field Experiments," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association;National Tax Journal, vol. 60(1), pages 109-127, March.
    8. Lisa Sanbonmatsu & Jeffrey R. Kling & Greg J. Duncan & Jeanne Brooks-Gunn, 2006. "Neighborhoods and Academic Achievement: Results from the Moving to Opportunity Experiment," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 41(4).
    9. Paul Frijters & Asad Islam & Chitwan Lalji & Debayan Pakrashi, 2019. "Roommate effects in health outcomes," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 28(8), pages 998-1034, August.
    10. Anna Piil Damm & Christian Dustmann, 2014. "Does Growing Up in a High Crime Neighborhood Affect Youth Criminal Behavior?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(6), pages 1806-1832, June.
    11. Jeffrey D. Michler & Anna Josephson, 2022. "Recent developments in inference: practicalities for applied economics," Chapters, in: A Modern Guide to Food Economics, chapter 11, pages 235-268, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    12. Monica P. Bhatt & Sara B. Heller & Max Kapustin & Marianne Bertrand & Christopher Blattman, 2023. "Predicting and Preventing Gun Violence: An Experimental Evaluation of READI Chicago," NBER Working Papers 30852, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Laura Jaitman, 2019. "Frontiers in the economics of crime: lessons for Latin America and the Caribbean," Latin American Economic Review, Springer;Centro de Investigaciòn y Docencia Económica (CIDE), vol. 28(1), pages 1-36, December.
    14. Grönqvist, Hans & Niknami, Susan, 2014. "Alcohol availability and crime: Lessons from liberalized weekend sales restrictions," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 81(C), pages 77-84.
    15. Lance Lochner, 2010. "Education Policy and Crime," NBER Chapters, in: Controlling Crime: Strategies and Tradeoffs, pages 465-515, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    16. Cheshire, Paul, 2009. "Policies for mixed communities: faith-based displacement activity?," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 30783, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    17. Patrick Bayer & Stephen L. Ross, 2006. "Identifying Individual and Group Effects in the Presence of Sorting: A Neighborhood Effects Application," Working papers 2006-13, University of Connecticut, Department of Economics, revised Jan 2009.
    18. Shoji, Masahiro, 2020. "Early-Life Circumstances and Adult Locus of Control: Evidence from 46 Developing Countries," MPRA Paper 99987, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    19. Jens Ludwig & Jeffrey R. Kling, 2007. "Is Crime Contagious?," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 50(3), pages 491-518.
    20. Seals, Richard Alan & Stern, Liliana V., 2013. "Cognitive ability and the division of labor in urban ghettos: Evidence from gang activity in U.S. data," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 140-149.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • C91 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Individual Behavior
    • C93 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Field Experiments
    • D03 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Behavioral Microeconomics: Underlying Principles
    • D1 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior
    • I24 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Education and Inequality
    • I3 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty
    • I32 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - Measurement and Analysis of Poverty
    • K42 - Law and Economics - - Legal Procedure, the Legal System, and Illegal Behavior - - - Illegal Behavior and the Enforcement of Law

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:21178. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.