Running Randomized Evaluations: A Practical Guide

by Rachel Glennerster, Kudzai Takavarasha

A comprehensive guide to running randomized impact evaluations of social programs in developing countriesThis book provides a comprehensive yet accessible guide to running randomized impact evaluations of social programs. Drawing on the experience of researchers at the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab, which has run hundreds of such evaluations in dozens of countries throughout the world, it offers practical insights on how to use this powerful technique, especially in resource-poor environments.This step-by-step guide explains why and when randomized evaluations are useful, in what situations they should be used, and how to prioritize different evaluation opportunities. It shows how to design and analyze studies that answer important questions while respecting the constraints of those working on and benefiting from the program being evaluated. The book gives concrete tips on issues such as improving the quality of a study despite tight budget constraints, and demonstrates how the results of randomized impact evaluations can inform policy.With its self-contained modules, this one-of-a-kind guide is easy to navigate. It also includes invaluable references and a checklist of the common pitfalls to avoid.

Provides the most up-to-date guide to running randomized evaluations of social programs, especially in developing countriesOffers practical tips on how to complete high-quality studies in even the most challenging environmentsSelf-contained modules allow for easy reference and flexible teaching and learningComprehensive yet nontechnical

Genres: Economics, Nonfiction, Science, Textbooks, Business, Research, Economic Development

475 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2013

Reviews

[Brice Karickhoff · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read this to prep for interviews with J-PAL and IPA. I really liked it a lot! But if you’ve never heard of J-PAL or IPA or RCTs or ITT effects or Wald Estimators or quasi-experimental impact evaluations, then you probably won’t like this book. Not for everyone is an understatement. For for a select few, it’s pure gold.

[Rachel Childers · Rating 4 out of 5]

A useful no-nonsense (if ever so slightly dated) guide on all the things to consider when running a randomized field experiment for a social or economic program, from some of the pros at J-PAL. The target is aid practitioners, and while it covers many of the topics an academic analyst would consider (like analysis of power, spillovers, noncompliance, loss to follow-up, etc), quite a bit of it is focused on less academic but crucial issues on the project management side, and is insightful about the interaction of the many many practical implementation constraints (getting buy in from local partners and governments, designing intervention and data collection protocols implementable by local staff, ethics, ethics, ethics, and more ethics, etc) with the design of an experiment which will actually be informative and drive policy decisions. It really makes clear that 90% of the work of running experiments is outside the basic "flip a coin and then see if the thing works" that you see in the typical academic writeup of one of these studies.
Since its 2013 publication, best practices for data analysis have evolved somewhat (so consult your local expert for advice on incorporating baseline covariates or clustering standard errors), and more experiments are designed with testing social scientific theories in mind, which engages a somewhat different, though complementary, set of concerns, but I would still classify this as required reading for anyone about to embark on running such an experiment, and important background for anyone looking to understand and engage critically with experimental literature in this area.

[Mansi Kabra · Rating 3 out of 5]

Simple and terse.

[Callan Corcoran · Rating 4 out of 5]

Glennerster offers a highly practical overview of understanding and generating development economics research. Each section provides rigorous frameworks through which to evaluate the quality of a study and identify limitations of a given research question. Particularly for those new to field experiments, this is a fundamental guide.

[Adam Široký · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very useful book on the topic of randomized evaluations. I've found myself coming back to it several times already, mainly to review the underlying statistical concepts and experimental design strategies. I will surely keep this one in my library and recommend it to everyone interested in RCTs or J-PAL.

[sara ∘˚˳°♡ · Rating 4 out of 5]

en verdad me parece muy buen libro para tener como manual o consultar cosas que necesites en tu trayectoria como investigador o en policy-making

pero no me pueden poner este libro para estudiármelo para una asignatura, desde luego que no pueden.....

interesante overall, sencillo de leer pero algo técnico a veces, aunque te da algunas bases de econometría

[Dustin Dye · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is hard to swallow, but it is probably the best reference on program evaluation. I recommend reading it slowly and pairing it with a practical workbook to get the most out of it.

[Hugo Salas · Rating 5 out of 5]

A Bible for all randomistas