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Better Knowledge Need Not Affect Behavior: A Randomized Evaluation of the Demand for Lottery Tickets in Rural Thailand

  • Juliane Zenker*
  • , Andreas Wagener
  • , Sebastian Vollmer
  • *Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleResearchpeer review

Abstract

Many households in developing countries spend substantial amounts on lottery tickets but have only poor knowledge about the properties of the game and hold upwardly biased beliefs on the prospects of winning. To test whether more accurate knowledge reduces lottery participation, households in rural Thailand were informed, in a randomized intervention, on the actual probability distribution of the Thai Government Lottery. This indeed led to a better knowledge about the Thai Government Lottery in the treatment group. However, the improved knowledge did not (substantially) affect the willingness to pay for lottery tickets.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)570-583
Number of pages14
JournalWorld Bank Economic Review
Volume32
Issue number3
E-pub ahead of print17 Nov 2016
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Oct 2018

Keywords

  • Field experiment
  • Information intervention
  • Lottery
  • Thailand

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Accounting
  • Development
  • Finance
  • Economics and Econometrics

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