IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cpr/ceprdp/11542.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Incentivizing Safer Sexual Behavior: Evidence from a Lottery Experiment on HIV Prevention

Author

Listed:
  • Björkman Nyqvist, Martina
  • de Walque, Damien
  • Corno, Lucia
  • Svensson, Jakob

Abstract

The need for effective HIV prevention programs, especially in Sub-Saharan Africa, remains urgent. We investigate the effect of a financial lottery program in Lesotho with relatively low expected payments but a chance to win a high prize conditional on negative test results for sexually transmitted infections. The intervention resulted in a 21.4% reduction in HIV incidence over two years. Lottery incentives appear to be particularly effective in targeting individuals with ex ante risky sexual behavior, consistent with the hypothesis that lotteries are more valued by individuals willing to take risks.

Suggested Citation

  • Björkman Nyqvist, Martina & de Walque, Damien & Corno, Lucia & Svensson, Jakob, 2016. "Incentivizing Safer Sexual Behavior: Evidence from a Lottery Experiment on HIV Prevention," CEPR Discussion Papers 11542, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    • Handle: RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:11542
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://cepr.org/publications/DP11542
    Download Restriction: CEPR Discussion Papers are free to download for our researchers, subscribers and members. If you fall into one of these categories but have trouble downloading our papers, please contact us at subscribers@cepr.org
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Crosby, R.A. & DiClemente, R.J. & Wingood, G.M. & Lang, D. & Harrington, K.F., 2003. "Value of Consistent Condom Use: A Study of Sexually Transmitted Disease Prevention among African American Adolescent Females," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 93(6), pages 901-902.
    2. Steffen Andersen & Glenn W. Harrison & Morten I. Lau & E. Elisabet Rutström, 2008. "Eliciting Risk and Time Preferences," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 76(3), pages 583-618, May.
    3. Oster, Emily, 2012. "HIV and sexual behavior change: Why not Africa?," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(1), pages 35-49.
    4. Hans-Peter Kohler & Rebecca L. Thornton, 2012. "Conditional Cash Transfers and HIV/AIDS Prevention: Unconditionally Promising?," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 26(2), pages 165-190.
    5. repec:pri:cheawb:kling_mto481 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. repec:pri:indrel:dsp01qz20ss50t is not listed on IDEAS
    7. Charles A. Holt & Susan K. Laury, 2002. "Risk Aversion and Incentive Effects," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(5), pages 1644-1655, December.
    8. Tomomi Tanaka & Colin F. Camerer & Quang Nguyen, 2010. "Risk and Time Preferences: Linking Experimental and Household Survey Data from Vietnam," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(1), pages 557-571, March.
    9. GlennW. Harrison & StevenJ. Humphrey & Arjan Verschoor, 2010. "Choice under Uncertainty: Evidence from Ethiopia, India and Uganda," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 120(543), pages 80-104, March.
    10. Jeffrey R. Kling & Jeffrey B. Liebman & Lawrence F. Katz & Lisa Sanbonmatsu, 2004. "Moving to Opportunity and Tranquility: Neighborhood Effects on Adult Economic Self-Sufficiency and Health From a Randomized Housing Voucher Experiment," Working Papers 5, Princeton University, Department of Economics, Industrial Relations Section..
    11. David S. Lee, 2009. "Training, Wages, and Sample Selection: Estimating Sharp Bounds on Treatment Effects," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 76(3), pages 1071-1102.
    12. Esther Duflo & Pascaline Dupas & Michael Kremer, 2015. "Education, HIV, and Early Fertility: Experimental Evidence from Kenya," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(9), pages 2757-2797, September.
    13. Daniel Kahneman & Amos Tversky, 2013. "Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision Under Risk," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Leonard C MacLean & William T Ziemba (ed.), HANDBOOK OF THE FUNDAMENTALS OF FINANCIAL DECISION MAKING Part I, chapter 6, pages 99-127, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    14. Quang Nguyen & Colin Camerer & Tomomi Tanaka, 2010. "Risk and Time Preferences Linking Experimental and Household Data from Vietnam," Post-Print halshs-00547090, HAL.
    15. Lucia Corno & Áureo de Paula, 2019. "Risky Sexual Behaviours: Biological Markers and Self‐reported Data," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 86(342), pages 229-261, April.
    16. repec:pri:cheawb:kling_mto481.pdf is not listed on IDEAS
    17. World Bank, 2014. "World Development Indicators 2014," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 18237, December.
    18. de Walque, Damien & Dow, William H & Nathan, Rose & Abdul, Ramadhani & Abilahi, Faraji & Gong, Erick & Isdahl, Zachary & Jamison, Julian & Jullu, Boniphace & Krishnan, Suneeta & Majura, Albert & Migue, 2012. "Incentivising safe sex: a randomised trial of conditional cash transfers for HIV and sexually transmitted infection prevention in rural Tanzania," Department of Economics, Working Paper Series qt4vw984q0, Department of Economics, Institute for Business and Economic Research, UC Berkeley.
    19. Nicholas C. Barberis, 2013. "Thirty Years of Prospect Theory in Economics: A Review and Assessment," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 27(1), pages 173-196, Winter.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Blog mentions

    As found by EconAcademics.org, the blog aggregator for Economics research:
    1. Sam Watson’s journal round-up for Monday 20th August 2018
      by Sam Watson in The Academic Health Economists' Blog on 2018-08-20 12:00:54

    Citations

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


    Cited by:

    1. Barber, Andrew & West, Jeremy, 2022. "Conditional cash lotteries increase COVID-19 vaccination rates," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).
    2. Allen, James & Mahumane, Arlete & Riddell, James & Rosenblat, Tanya & Yang, Dean & Yu, Hang, 2022. "Teaching and incentives: Substitutes or complements?," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 91(C).
    3. Ben S. Meiselman & Collin Weigel & Paul J. Ferraro & Mark Masters & Kent D. Messer & Olesya M. Savchenko & Jordan F. Suter, 2022. "Lottery Incentives and Resource Management: Evidence from the Agricultural Data Reporting Incentive Program (AgDRIP)," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 82(4), pages 847-867, August.
    4. Galárraga, Omar & Kuo, Caroline & Mtukushe, Bulelwa & Maughan-Brown, Brendan & Harrison, Abigail & Hoare, Jackie, 2020. "iSAY (incentives for South African youth): Stated preferences of young people living with HIV," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 265(C).
    5. Aaron Richterman & Harsha Thirumurthy, 2022. "The effects of cash transfer programmes on HIV-related outcomes in 42 countries from 1996 to 2019," Nature Human Behaviour, Nature, vol. 6(10), pages 1362-1371, October.
    6. de Walque, Damien & Chukwuma, Adanna & Ayivi-Guedehoussou, Nono & Koshkakaryan, Marianna, 2022. "Invitations, incentives, and conditions: A randomized evaluation of demand-side interventions for health screenings," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 296(C).
    7. Kelly Kilburn & Lucia Ferrone & Audrey Pettifor & Ryan Wagner & F. Xavier Gómez-Olivé & Kathy Kahn, 2020. "The Impact of a Conditional Cash Transfer on Multidimensional Deprivation of Young Women: Evidence from South Africa’s HTPN 068," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 151(3), pages 865-895, October.
    8. Elice, Paola & Martínez Flores, Fernanda & Reichert, Arndt R., 2023. "Religious terrorism, forced migration, and women's empowerment: Evidence from the Boko Haram insurgency," Ruhr Economic Papers 1044, RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-University Bochum, TU Dortmund University, University of Duisburg-Essen.
    9. Banerjee,Abhijit & La Ferrara,Eliana & Orozco Olvera,Victor Hugo, 2019. "The Entertaining Way to Behavioral Change : Fighting HIV with MTV," Policy Research Working Paper Series 8998, The World Bank.
    10. Lépine, Aurélia & Treibich, Carole, 2020. "Risk aversion and HIV/AIDS: Evidence from Senegalese female sex workers," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 256(C).
    11. Jason J. Ong & Nyasule Neke & Mwita Wambura & Evodius Kuringe & Jonathan M. Grund & Marya Plotkin & Marc d’Elbée & Sergio Torres-Rueda & Hally R. Mahler & Helen A. Weiss & Fern Terris-Prestholt, 2019. "Use of Lotteries for the Promotion of Voluntary Medical Male Circumcision Service: A Discrete-Choice Experiment among Adult Men in Tanzania," Medical Decision Making, , vol. 39(4), pages 474-485, May.
    12. Friedman, Willa & Wilson, Nicholas, 2022. "Can nudging overcome procrastinating on preventive health investments?," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 45(C).

    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. Nyqvist,Martina Björkman & Corno,Lucia & De Walque,Damien B. C. M. & Svensson,Jakob, 2015. "Using lotteries to incentivize safer sexual behavior : evidence from a randomized controlled trial on HIV prevention," Policy Research Working Paper Series 7215, The World Bank.
    2. Kerri Brick & Martine Visser & Justine Burns, 2012. "Risk Aversion: Experimental Evidence from South African Fishing Communities," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 94(1), pages 133-152.
    3. Julia Ihli, Hanna & Chiputwa, Brian & Winter, Etti & Gassner, Anja, 2022. "Risk and time preferences for participating in forest landscape restoration: The case of coffee farmers in Uganda," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 150(C).
    4. Bocqueho, Geraldine & Jacquet, Florence & Reynaud, Arnaud, 2011. "Expected Utility or Prospect Theory Maximizers? Results from a Structural Model based on Field-experiment Data," 2011 International Congress, August 30-September 2, 2011, Zurich, Switzerland 114257, European Association of Agricultural Economists.
    5. Tristan Le Cotty & Elodie Maître d’Hôtel & Raphael Soubeyran & Julie Subervie, 2018. "Linking Risk Aversion, Time Preference and Fertiliser Use in Burkina Faso," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 54(11), pages 1991-2006, November.
    6. Ryan O. Murphy & Robert H. W. ten Brincke, 2018. "Hierarchical Maximum Likelihood Parameter Estimation for Cumulative Prospect Theory: Improving the Reliability of Individual Risk Parameter Estimates," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 64(1), pages 308-328, January.
    7. Gary Charness & Thomas Garcia & Theo Offerman & Marie Claire Villeval, 2020. "Do measures of risk attitude in the laboratory predict behavior under risk in and outside of the laboratory?," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 60(2), pages 99-123, April.
    8. Aurélien Baillon & Owen O'Donnell & Stella Quimbo & Kim van Wilgenburg, 2022. "Do time preferences explain low health insurance take‐up?," Journal of Risk & Insurance, The American Risk and Insurance Association, vol. 89(4), pages 951-983, December.
    9. de Walque, Damien, 2020. "The use of financial incentives to prevent unhealthy behaviors: A review," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 261(C).
    10. Schleich, Joachim & Gassmann, Xavier & Meissner, Thomas & Faure, Corinne, 2019. "A large-scale test of the effects of time discounting, risk aversion, loss aversion, and present bias on household adoption of energy-efficient technologies," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 80(C), pages 377-393.
    11. Holden, Stein T. & Tilahun, Mesfin, 2021. "Shocks and Stability of Risk Preferences," CLTS Working Papers 5/21, Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Centre for Land Tenure Studies.
    12. Shuoli Zhao & Chengyan Yue, 2020. "Risk preferences of commodity crop producers and specialty crop producers: An application of prospect theory," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 51(3), pages 359-372, May.
    13. Charness, Gary & Gneezy, Uri & Imas, Alex, 2013. "Experimental methods: Eliciting risk preferences," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 87(C), pages 43-51.
    14. Lucy F. Ackert & Richard Deaves & Jennifer Miele & Quang Nguyen, 2020. "Are Time Preference and Risk Preference Associated with Cognitive Intelligence and Emotional Intelligence?," Journal of Behavioral Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 21(2), pages 136-156, April.
    15. Ihli, Hanna Julia & Chiputwa, Brian & Musshoff, Oliver, 2016. "Do Changing Probabilities or Payoffs in Lottery-Choice Experiments Affect Risk Preference Outcomes? Evidence from Rural Uganda," Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Western Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 41(2), May.
    16. Insaf Bekir & Faten Doss, 2020. "Status quo bias and attitude towards risk: An experimental investigation," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 41(5), pages 827-838, July.
    17. Thomas Meissner & Xavier Gassmann & Corinne Faure & Joachim Schleich, 2023. "Individual characteristics associated with risk and time preferences: A multi country representative survey," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 66(1), pages 77-107, February.
    18. Bernedo Del Carpio, María & Alpizar, Francisco & Ferraro, Paul J., 2022. "Time and risk preferences of individuals, married couples and unrelated pairs," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 97(C).
    19. Ward, Patrick S. & Singh, Vartika, 2013. "Risk and Ambiguity Preferences and the Adoption of New Agricultural Technologies: Evidence from Field Experiments in Rural India," 2013 Annual Meeting, August 4-6, 2013, Washington, D.C. 150794, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    20. Géraldine Bocquého & Julien Jacob & Marielle Brunette, 2020. "Prospect theory in experiments : behaviour in loss domain and framing effects," Working Papers hal-02987294, HAL.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Financial incentives; Lotteries; Hiv prevention;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I12 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health Behavior
    • I15 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health and Economic Development
    • O15 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Economic Development: Human Resources; Human Development; Income Distribution; Migration

    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:cpr:ceprdp:11542. 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://www.cepr.org .

    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.