Social Comparison and Peer Effects at an Elite College.

A study was conducted to see whether peer effects could be observed among undergraduates at Williams College, an elite four-year liberal arts school. Specifically, the study explored whether students in the bottom third of their class, with average SAT's of about 1300, would perform better in writing about newspaper articles they read and discussed in groups of three if the two others in the group were academically superior -- from the top third of their class, with SAT's averaging about 1500 -- rather than similar -- also from the bottom third of the class. The results showed that women subjects performed better if their discussion partners were from the top third of the class, but men did better if their discussion partners were from the bottom third. Alternative analyses comparing subjects who had better or worse discussion partners as determined by the quality of their peers videotaped discussion statements, showed that across gender subjects did better written work when their discussion partners were better. The results were interpreted in terms of the principles of social comparison theory (Festinger, 1954).EDUCATION ; SOCIETY ; UNIVERSITIES

Thinking Seriously about Paying for College: The Large Effects of a Little Thought.

The high price of attending college has generated a great deal of discussion and some heated controversy in recent years. Popular opinions generally depict college prices as unreasonable, unjustified, and unpayable. In the context of thinking seriously about the ways colleges and universities ought to approach the difficult issue of pricing in higher education, we survey students at various institutions in order to seek insight into how students think about the amount they pay, and what they get for their money. More specifically, we ask students to seriously consider the subsidy associated with their educational program, and the effect that a change in the size of this subsidy might have on this program. As a result of this exercise, we find that students tend to regard the price of their education as significantly more reasonable than they had prior to thinking seriously about its cost.EDUCATION ; PRICING

Opinions on the Tax Deductibility of Mortgages and the Consensus Effect

consensus effect, experiment, survey, taxation, C8, C9, D8, H2,

Community college transfer students’ probabilities of baccalaureate receipt as a function of their prevalence in four‐year colleges and departments

The present paper determines whether community college transfer students have higher baccalaureate rates when they enroll in four‐year colleges and departments that have larger shares of transfer students. Transfers attending non‐technical campuses with larger shares of transfers have higher eight‐year baccalaureate rates, but within‐campus increases in share transfers do not increase transfer graduation rates. Transfers in departments with large shares of transfer students have significantly lower graduation rates, but natives in such departments do not. Within‐department increases in transfer student presence are positively correlated with transfer eight‐year graduation rates and negatively correlated with native eight‐year graduation rates, indicating an opportunity for efficiency gains if influxes of transfers are separated from natives.peer effects, transfer education, community colleges, human capital,