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Danila Serra
Associate Professor of Economics
Texas A&M University
Overview of Current Research as a PDF
I currently have three primary lines of research, within the broad fields
of: 1) political economy; 2) economics of education; 3) development economics.
My early work focused primarily on the first line of
research, and employed laboratory experiments to investigate individuals’
decision to engage in corruption. In the field, much of my past work focused on
subpar behavior of health and education service providers in low-income
countries, and on service recipients’ willingness and ability to hold
them accountable. I currently have three completed papers and one ongoing
project within this line of research. One paper (“Activating Change: The Role of Information
and Beliefs in Social Activism” with F. Afridi, A. Basistha
and A. Dhillon) employs an online survey experiment
in India to examine the drivers of remote
social activism, i.e., activism that does not require in-person engagement,
such petition signing, donations to NGOs and engagement with video campaigns. A
second related paper (“Can Crises Affect Citizen Activism? Evidence from
a Pandemic” with the same coauthors) uses
quasi-experimental methods to test the impact of the (largely unexpected)
second wave of the pandemic in India on social activism aimed at reducing fraud
and corruption in the health sector. A third paper (“Proud to belong: The impact of ethics
training on police officers in Ghana” with Donna Harris, Oana Borcan, Hanry Telli,
Bruno Schettini and Stefan Dercon) employs an RCT in Ghana to test the impact of an ethics
training program for traffic police officers on unethical behavior. In the past
year, we were able to obtain partial administrative data from the Ghana Police
to complement our impact evaluation. Another ongoing project within this line of research (“Who self-select into committees: The
pro-social or the corrupt?”
with former student Andy Cao and Dmitry Ryvkin),
employs a laboratory experiment to investigate self-selection into committees
managing public funds.
My second line of research focuses on the economics of education, asking
primarily what interventions could succeed in diversifying male- and
white-dominated fields of study. In my previous work (“Gender differences in the choice of major:
The importance of female role models”), Catherine Porter (Lancaster University) and I found that
in-person exposure to female role models could attract more women into
economics. In ongoing follow-up work, Catherine and I assess the impact of the
role model intervention on labor market outcomes. Another ongoing project, joint with Jonathan Meer (Texas A&M University)
employs an RCT targeting high school counselors in Texas with the aim of
increasing awareness about the economics major. We have received funding from
the Social Science Research Council (SSRC) and CSWEP to evaluate our
intervention using the Texas Education Research Center data. In another project, joint with Daniel Gomez-Vasquez (PhD candidate,
Texas A&M University), we employ an RCT aimed at increasing well-being and
retention among under-represented economics majors at TAMU through
encouragement emails sent on behalf of the economics department. I am also
working on a project in Peru,
joint with Marcos Agurto (Universidad de Piura) and Sudipta Sarangi (Virginia Tech University) aimed at
increasing interest in the engineering major among female high school students.
We recently piloted a novel RCT consisting in Instagram reels targeting female
students, and information videos targeting teachers and shared through
WhatsApp. New work
with Celeste Carruthers (University of Tennessee), Kalena
Cortes (Texas A&M) and Ishara Casellas
Connors (Texas A&M), recently funded by JPAL, will examine the impact of
targeted coaching programs on student transfers from community colleges to
4-year colleges.
My third line of research focuses primarily on gender disparities in low-income countries.
A project
in Somalia (joint with Elijah Kipchumba,
Catherine Porter and Munshi Sulaiman)
employs an RCT to examine whether exposure to male or female role models
(college students) affects gender attitudes and educational aspirations,
education outcomes of primary school students. An ongoing project in
Uganda (joint with Kjetil Bjorvatn,
Shymal Chowdhury, Catalina Franco and Munshi Sulaiman) evaluates the
impact of female leadership in Village Savings and Loan Associations (VSLAs).
In collaboration with BRAC Uganda, we implemented a field experiment consisting
in nudging VSLAs to appoint a new Chairperson. In randomly selected VSLAs, the
nudge was to appoint a woman; in other randomly selected VSLAs the nudge was to
appoint a new male Chairperson. We examine the treatments’ impacts on
female leadership and VSLA performance, as well as chairperson’s and
members’ well-being and attitudes. Another project in Northern Uganda (joint
with Alessandra Cassar, Eeshani
Kandpal, Miranda Lambert and Christine Mbabazi) employs lab-in-the-field experiments and surveys
to examine the long-term impact of extreme war victimization (i.e., childhood abduction) on women's mental
health, preferences, and socio-economic outcomes. A follow-up study
assesses through an RCT the effects of unconditional cash transfers,
group-based coaching and group-based mental health counseling on the well-being
of a larger sample of women who were victimized as children.
In the past year, I have expanded my work in development
economics (which so far primarily focused on countries in Sub-Saharan Africa)
to South Asia. Together with Raymond Robertson (Bush School, TAMU), Farzana Afridi (Indian
Statistical Institute) and Hamna Ahmed (Lahore School
of Economics), I was awarded an IZA|G2LM
large grant to investigate (through surveys and RCTs) barriers to
women’s career advancement in the apparel industry in Bangladesh, India
and Pakistan. This work will take place in collaboration with the H&M Group.
Also with Raymond Robertson, I received funding from the US State Department
– through a collaborative agreement – to design and implement
research aimed at facilitating women’s active participation in the Green
Transition in Pakistan’s apparel industry.
Finally, I have ongoing
experimental/behavioral projects aimed at identifying or correcting biases in
hiring or career advancement. One
project joint with Elira Kuka
(George Washington University) uses an RCT to evaluate the impact of a
streamlined mentoring program (the Adopt a
Paper program) on the academic success of junior faculty in economics. Another project,
joint with Tim Salmon (southern Methodist University) and TAMU PhD candidates
Daniel Gomez-Vasquez and Miranda Lambert, employs a laboratory experiment to
assess the impact of different modes of communication – in-person, video
call, audio-only call and instant messaging – on the dynamics of work
relationships between team members of different genders. A third project, joint with Daniel Gomez-Vasquez and Tim Salmon,
extends Daniel’s dissertation work on the drivers of hiring biases
against Black and Hispanic workers.