IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/aea/aejpol/v15y2023i1p510-42.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Student Performance, Peer Effects, and Friend Networks: Evidence from a Randomized Peer Intervention

Author

Listed:
  • Jia Wu
  • Junsen Zhang
  • Chunchao Wang

Abstract

We estimate the effects of an educational peer intervention in which previously high- and low-achieving students are randomly paired as deskmates in elementary schools in China. Our treatment boosts the mathematics scores of the low-achieving students. Moreover, the treatment enhances the extraversion and agreeableness of high- and low-achieving students, thereby providing evidence that peers can influence personality traits. The positive treatment effects can be attributed to the deskmate-level peer effects. We document friend network structure changes and present additional evidence on how friendship ties help us better understand the mechanisms behind peer effects.

Suggested Citation

  • Jia Wu & Junsen Zhang & Chunchao Wang, 2023. "Student Performance, Peer Effects, and Friend Networks: Evidence from a Randomized Peer Intervention," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 15(1), pages 510-542, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:aea:aejpol:v:15:y:2023:i:1:p:510-42
    DOI: 10.1257/pol.20200563
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.aeaweb.org/doi/10.1257/pol.20200563
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://doi.org/10.3886/E149262V2
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.aeaweb.org/doi/10.1257/pol.20200563.appx
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.aeaweb.org/doi/10.1257/pol.20200563.ds
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to AEA members and institutional subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1257/pol.20200563?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Bhargava, Palaash & Chen, Daniel L. & Sutter, Matthias & Terrier, Camille, 2022. "Homophily and Transmission of Behavioral Traits in Social Networks," IZA Discussion Papers 15840, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • I21 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Analysis of Education
    • I26 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Returns to Education
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
    • O15 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Economic Development: Human Resources; Human Development; Income Distribution; Migration
    • P36 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Socialist Institutions and Their Transitions - - - Consumer Economics; Health; Education and Training; Welfare, Income, Wealth, and Poverty
    • Z13 - Other Special Topics - - Cultural Economics - - - Economic Sociology; Economic Anthropology; Language; Social and Economic Stratification

    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:aea:aejpol:v:15:y:2023:i:1:p:510-42. 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.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using 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: Michael P. Albert (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/aeaaaea.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.