IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/wly/ectrin/v33y2025i2p305-337.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

An experiment on the stability of business environment perceptions in a firm survey

Author

Listed:
  • Asif M. Islam
  • Jorge Rodriguez Meza

Abstract

Perception‐based survey questions have been widely employed to evaluate the business environment. In the World Bank Enterprise Surveys, such questions involve rating an element of the business environment at the end of each section of the survey instrument. They often elicit responses inconsistent with similar questions based on the firm's experience over a specific timeframe. In this study, an experiment is analysed that randomizes the placement order of the perception‐based questions either at the end of a section or at the beginning of the survey. Significant question‐order effects are uncovered for perceptions of corruption (9%–13% point) and business licencing and permits (7%–8% point) but not the other elements after accounting for a variety of factors; there are no questions‐order effects for experience‐based questions. The study recommends that analyses in these two areas validate perception‐based questions with corresponding experience‐based questions. This adds to a larger literature that emphasizes the importance of data quality and its far‐reaching economic benefits especially in guiding policy.

Suggested Citation

  • Asif M. Islam & Jorge Rodriguez Meza, 2025. "An experiment on the stability of business environment perceptions in a firm survey," Economics of Transition and Institutional Change, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 33(2), pages 305-337, April.
  • Handle: RePEc:wly:ectrin:v:33:y:2025:i:2:p:305-337
    DOI: 10.1111/ecot.12434
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/ecot.12434
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/ecot.12434?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
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Susann Rohwedder & Steven J. Haider & Michael D. Hurd, 2006. "INCREASES IN WEALTH AMONG THE ELDERLY IN THE EARLY 1990s: HOW MUCH IS DUE TO SURVEY DESIGN?," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 52(4), pages 509-524, December.
    2. Beck, Thorsten & Demirguc-Kunt, Asli & Laeven, Luc & Maksimovic, Vojislav, 2006. "The determinants of financing obstacles," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 25(6), pages 932-952, October.
    3. repec:cup:apsrev:v:98:y:2004:i:01:p:191-207_00 is not listed on IDEAS
    4. Catherine Roux & Christian Thöni, 2015. "Do control questions influence behavior in experiments?," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 18(2), pages 185-194, June.
    5. de Nicola, Francesca & Giné, Xavier, 2014. "How accurate are recall data? Evidence from coastal India," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 52-65.
    6. Shambaugh, George E. & Shen, Elaine B., 2018. "A clear advantage: The benefits of transparency to crisis recovery," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 391-416.
    7. Dan Ariely & George Loewenstein & Drazen Prelec, 2003. ""Coherent Arbitrariness": Stable Demand Curves Without Stable Preferences," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 118(1), pages 73-106.
    8. Furnham, Adrian & Boo, Hua Chu, 2011. "A literature review of the anchoring effect," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 40(1), pages 35-42, February.
    9. Bergman, Oscar & Ellingsen, Tore & Johannesson, Magnus & Svensson, Cicek, 2010. "Anchoring and cognitive ability," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 107(1), pages 66-68, April.
    10. Stefania Sitzia & Daniel Zizzo, 2011. "Does product complexity matter for competition in experimental retail markets?," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 70(1), pages 65-82, January.
    11. Carlin, Wendy & Schaffer, Mark E & Seabright, Paul, 2007. "Where Are the Real Bottlenecks? Evidence from 20,000 Firms in 60 Countries about the Shadow Costs of Constraints to Firm Performance," IZA Discussion Papers 3059, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    12. Gatti, Roberta & Lederman, Daniel & Islam, Asif M. & Nguyen, Ha & Lotfi, Rana & Emam Mousa, Mennatallah, 2024. "Data transparency and GDP growth forecast errors," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 140(C).
    13. Thorsten Beck & Asli Demirgüç‐Kunt & Vojislav Maksimovic, 2005. "Financial and Legal Constraints to Growth: Does Firm Size Matter?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 60(1), pages 137-177, February.
    14. Brañas-Garza, Pablo & Ciacci, Riccardo & Ramírez, Ericka G. Rascón, 2022. "Anchors matter: Eliciting maternal expectations on educational outcomes," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 90(C).
    15. Hodelin, Reynaldo Senra, 2022. "Statistical disclosure and economic growth: What is the nexus?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 160(C).
    16. Simon Commander & Jan Svejnar, 2011. "Business Environment, Exports, Ownership, and Firm Performance," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 93(1), pages 309-337, February.
    17. Sugden, Robert & Zheng, Jiwei & Zizzo, Daniel John, 2013. "Not all anchors are created equal," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 39(C), pages 21-31.
    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. Catherine Roux & Christian Thöni, 2015. "Do control questions influence behavior in experiments?," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 18(2), pages 185-194, June.
    2. Meub, Lukas & Proeger, Till, 2014. "Are groups 'less behavioral'? The case of anchoring," University of Göttingen Working Papers in Economics 188, University of Goettingen, Department of Economics.
    3. Magdalena Brzozowicz & Michał Krawczyk, 2020. "Honey, Mugs and Caricatures: anchors on prices of consumer goods only hold hypothetically," Working Papers 2020-40, Faculty of Economic Sciences, University of Warsaw.
    4. Li, Lunzheng & Maniadis, Zacharias & Sedikides, Constantine, 2021. "Anchoring in Economics: A Meta-Analysis of Studies on Willingness-To-Pay and Willingness-To-Accept," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 90(C).
    5. Jetter, Michael & Walker, Jay K., 2017. "Anchoring in financial decision-making: Evidence from Jeopardy!," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 141(C), pages 164-176.
    6. Klaus Friesenbichler & Oliver Fritz & Werner Hölzl & Gerhard Streicher & Florian Misch & Mustafa Yeter, 2014. "The Efficiency of EU Public Administration in Helping Firms Grow," WIFO Studies, WIFO, number 50931, March.
    7. Ortiz, Jose M. & Teixeira, Lucas I. & Falcão, Natália N.L. & Soki, Erika A. & Almeida, Raquel M., 2024. "Information simplification and default choices improve financial decisions: A credit card statement experiment," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 110(C).
    8. Markus Spiwoks & Zulia Gubaydullina, 2020. "The Magic of Figures: Anchoring and Interferences," Journal of Finance and Investment Analysis, SCIENPRESS Ltd, vol. 9(3), pages 1-2.
    9. Jonathan E. Alevy & Craig E. Landry & John A. List, 2015. "Field Experiments On The Anchoring Of Economic Valuations," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 53(3), pages 1522-1538, July.
    10. Sitzia, Stefania & Zizzo, Daniel John, 2012. "Price lower and then higher or price higher and then lower?," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 33(6), pages 1084-1099.
    11. Magdalena Brzozowicz & Michał Krawczyk & Przemysław Kusztelak, 2017. "Do anchors hold for real? Anchoring effect and hypothetical bias in declared WTP," Working Papers 2017-24, Faculty of Economic Sciences, University of Warsaw.
    12. Glenk, Klaus & Meyerhoff, Jürgen & Akaichi, Faical & Martin-Ortega, Julia, 2019. "Revisiting cost vector effects in discrete choice experiments," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 135-155.
    13. Friesenbichler, Klaus & Fritz, Oliver & Hölzl, Werner & Misch, Florian & Streicher, Gerhard & Yeter, Mustafa, 2014. "The efficiency of EU public administration in helping firms grow: Final report," ZEW Expertises, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research, number 111450, February.
    14. Konstantinos Ioannidis & Theo Offerman & Randolph Sloof, 2020. "On the effect of anchoring on valuations when the anchor is transparently uninformative," Journal of the Economic Science Association, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 6(1), pages 77-94, June.
    15. Tanya O’Garra & Matthew R Sisco, 2020. "The effect of anchors and social information on behaviour," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(4), pages 1-19, April.
    16. Ioannidis, Konstantinos, 2023. "Anchoring on valuations and perceived informativeness," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 106(C).
    17. Yigit Oezcelik & Michel Tolksdorf, 2023. "Non-numerical and social anchoring in consumer-generated ratings," Working Papers 202319, University of Liverpool, Department of Economics.
    18. Bonaccorsi, Andrea & Apreda, Riccardo & Fantoni, Gualtiero, 2020. "Expert biases in technology foresight. Why they are a problem and how to mitigate them," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 151(C).
    19. Myint Moe Chit, 2018. "Political openness and the growth of small and medium enterprises: empirical evidence from transition economies," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 55(2), pages 781-804, September.
    20. Knack, Steve & Xu, Lixin Colin, 2017. "Unbundling institutions for external finance: Worldwide firm-level evidence," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 215-232.

    More about this item

    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:wly:ectrin:v:33:y:2025:i:2:p:305-337. 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: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://doi.org/10.1111/(ISSN)2577-6983 .

    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.