Subjective well-being and the gender composition of the reference group: Evidence from a survey experiment
Fumagalli, Elena; Fumagalli, Laura
(2022) Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, volume 194, pp. 196 - 219
(Article)
Abstract
This paper tests how people’s subjective well-being reacts when they compare themselves with other people of the same gender, and if this reaction differs between women and men. We implement a randomized control trial prompting some respondents to compare themselves with people of the same gender and leaving the reference
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group of others unconstrained. Treated women report higher income and leisure satisfaction. Evaluating satisfaction in relation to a given reference group may be cognitively demanding. When accounting for this, we find that the treatment also increases women’s health satisfaction. No or small effects are found for men, suggesting that the reference group affects subjective well-being reporting of men and women differently.
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Keywords: Gender differences, Well-being, RCT, A Journal
ISSN: 0167-2681
Publisher: Elsevier
Note: Funding Information: We are grateful to Cara Booker, Chris Bollinger, Tom Crossley, Conchita D’Ambrosio, Peter Ditto, Thomas Martin, Elaine Prentice-Lane, Stephanie Rosenkranz, Anna Salomons, and seminar participants at Utrecht University (Utrecht, Netherlands), the 2018 Lisbon Meeting on Economics and Political Science (Lisbon, Portugal), the third Dondena workshop on public policy (Milan, Italy), the 9th Alpine Population Conference (la Thuile, Italy) and the 2019 Understanding Society Scientific Conference (Colchester, UK) for useful comments and suggestions. This study can be found in the AEA RCT Registry (AEARCTR-0005177). Understanding Society is an initiative funded by the Economic and Social Research Council and various Government Departments, with scientific leadership by the Institute for Social and Economic Research, University of Essex, and survey delivery by NatCen Social Research and Kantar Public. The research data are distributed by the UK Data Service. One of the authors was funded by ESRC ES/N00812/1 and ES/S012486/1. Funding Information: We are grateful to Cara Booker, Chris Bollinger, Tom Crossley, Conchita D'Ambrosio, Peter Ditto, Thomas Martin, Elaine Prentice-Lane, Stephanie Rosenkranz, Anna Salomons, and seminar participants at Utrecht University (Utrecht, Netherlands), the 2018 Lisbon Meeting on Economics and Political Science (Lisbon, Portugal), the third Dondena workshop on public policy (Milan, Italy), the 9th Alpine Population Conference (la Thuile, Italy) and the 2019 Understanding Society Scientific Conference (Colchester, UK) for useful comments and suggestions. This study can be found in the AEA RCT Registry (AEARCTR-0005177). Understanding Society is an initiative funded by the Economic and Social Research Council and various Government Departments, with scientific leadership by the Institute for Social and Economic Research, University of Essex, and survey delivery by NatCen Social Research and Kantar Public. The research data are distributed by the UK Data Service. One of the authors was funded by ESRC ES/N00812/1 and ES/S012486/1. Publisher Copyright: © 2021 The Author(s)
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