Teacher biases, student attitudes and improving educational outcomes in

Peru

Renos Vakis

September 9, 2016

Behavioral Initiatives

Attitudes and world view (mental models)• Chapter 3, The World Development Report 2015

• They influence the process of decision making…and hence outcomes• Is there scope for policy?

Our biaseshttps://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/takeatest.html

Stereotypes, mental models and achievement

Identidad asiatica Control Genero65

70

75

80

85

90

95

Math score(10 year old American girls from Asian

descent)Sc

ore

Asian-American Control Female

Nalini Ambady et al (2001)

Let’s go to Peru

Peru contextOngoing work in Ministry of Education exploring

1. Teacher attitudes and motivation2. Student attitudes and low performance

Research project 1: Do teachers use their biases to assess students’ performance?with Gabriela Farfan and Alaka Holla (World Bank)

• Teachers are key input for student’s performance

• Teacher expectations for their students affects school performance and student aspirations (Rosenthal y Jacobson, 1968, Upadyaya and Eccles, 2014)

• Teachers influence student’s long term outcomes (Chatty et al. 2013)• Non-observable teacher characteristics explain a large share of student performance

• How do teachers assess students’ performance?• We typically think of exams as objective indications of scholastic aptitude• But teachers often have some discretion in grading• Plus, kids are not always consistent so it might be hard to extract a clear signal from their

behavior

What we do• What we do: replicate and expand evidence by Darley and Gross (Journal

of Personality and Social Psychology, 1983) for teachers in Lima

• 600 teachers from 100 schools in Lima

• Teachers watch a video of a 9-year old student (Diego) taking an exam

• Random teacher assignments in one of two versions of background video• Diego comes from 2nd quintile (poor)• Diego comes from 3rd quintile (non-poor)

• Teachers assess Diego’s performance on three dimensions• Cognitive• Behavioral• Schooling expectations

Video timeline1.

Project presentati

on

2. Background video on Diego

3. Testing video

4. Survey on

Diego’s performan

ceDiego Pobre

Diego No Pobre

What happened?School grade

Poor Non-poor3

3.5

3.2

3.4

Poor Non-poor

Grad

e le

vel

Poor Non-poor0

20

40

60

40

60

Poor Non-poor

%

Expect to go beyond secondary

2 months20 pp

So…• Teacher systematically use their mental model to affect

their judgement and assess student performance

• By a lot

• And form a judgment on various domains (cognitive, expectations)

Areas for solutions

Education … information, awareness, alternative modelsExposure … social contact, role models, environmentApproach … higher level processing, reduce cognitive load, checklist, procedures (slow down)

STATUS: Debriefing, exploring….

Project 2: improving student motivation and educational outcomeswith Ingo Outes (Oxford) and Alan Sanchez (GRADE)

• Student school performance and aspirations can be affected by

• Parents• Self-identification into groups (math example and stereotypes,

also Neuville y Croizet, 2007; Steele & Aronson, 1995 )• Teacher expectations and beliefs (Rosenthal y Jacobson, 1968)

• Brain malleability and mental models

• Evolving evidence on traits and malleability (intelligence and personality)

• Changing mental models of brain malleability and link to improved motivation, effort and school outcomes ((Dweck et al. 1995; Dweck, 2006; Blackwell et al. 2007; Paunesku et al. 2012; Yeager et al. 2012)

05

1015

20C

hild

ren'

s E

duca

tiona

l Asp

iratio

ns

0 5 10 15 20Parent's Educational Aspirations

Children-Parent aspiration 45%

Children’s educational aspirations closely mirror those of their parents

What did we do?• Inspired by growth mindset literature to design a simple

intervention• Where

• 800 secondary schools in poorer neighborhoods in Lima, Ancash and Junin• Around 50,000 students in 1st and 2nd grade

• What• Introduced a 90 minute session on brain malleability• In-class assignment – write a letter to give advice on how to exercise brain• Class posters for salience• Low cost

• 2-3 months before end of school year• Use national test exam to evaluate test scores in math and

language

Overall impacts

Math (*) Spanish Index (*)-0.05

0.00

0.05

0.10

0.15

0.20

0.25ITT impact

ITT

Impa

ct%

of s

tand

ard

devi

-at

ions

School level, N = 799

Impacts by region

Math Spanish Index Math (**) Spanish Index (*)Lima, N = 391 Ancash-Junin, N = 408

-0.15

-0.05

0.05

0.15

0.25

0.35

0.45ITT impact

ITT

Impa

ct%

of s

tand

ard

devi

-at

ions

Impacts by quartile

Q1N =

4413

Q2N =

9033

Q3 (**)N =

4345

Q4N =

3909

Q1N =

4413

Q2N =

9033

Q3 (*)N =

4344

Q4 (**)N =

3910Math Spanish

-0.20

-0.10

0.00

0.10

0.20

0.30

0.40

0.50 ITT impact

ITT

Impa

ct%

of s

tand

ard

devi-

atio

ns

Summary• Large increases in test performance

• Extremely effective and low cost

• Hypothesis for mechanism: student AND teacher change of mental models

• Heterogeneous effects

Next steps• Phase 1

• Exploring mechanisms and heterogeneity of impacts further• Are impacts sustainable a year later?

• Phase 2 (adapting in 2800 schools/150,000 students) isolating teacher v. student channels

• Video vs Text• Single-Session vs Double-Session• Teacher Module• Timing of Delivery

• Adapting and replicating in other countries (Indonesia, Ghana…)

Thank you!

rvakis@worldbank.org