Can teaching negotiation techniques increase education?

Responsible researcher: Adriano Valladão Pires Ribeiro

Article title: NEGOTIATING A BETTER FUTURE: HOW INTERPERSONAL SKILLS FACILITATE INTERGENERATIONAL INVESTMENT

Article authors: Nava Ashraf, Natalie Bau, Corinne Low and Kathleen McGinn

Intervention location: Lusaka, Zambia

Sample size : 3,146 teenagers

Sector: Education

Type of Intervention: Effect of the negotiation techniques teaching program

Variable of main interest: Number of enrollments

Evaluation method: Experimental Evaluation (RCT)

Policy Problem

Returns on investments in children's education are only seen after many years and huge restrictions such as increases in school fees lead to a high school dropout rate at the end of primary education. This is a problem faced by teenagers in Zambia, where, if parents do not correctly internalize the benefits of their daughters' schooling, it can lead to lower investments in education than desirable, that is, a girl can end up studying less than she should. according to your skills. The end result would be the worsening of issues related to economic development and social well-being.

Assessment Context

A possible solution could come from empowering young people to make decisions about how much to invest in their education, in particular, exploring the mutual relationship with the person responsible to generate joint gains. Despite there being a high degree of dependence of young women on their parents, there is a space in which teenagers would be able to negotiate and influence the decisions of those responsible, not just being receptacles for parental deliberations. Based on this idea, a two-week training program was formulated for teenage girls in Zambia that taught them negotiation skills, recognizing the reality of the paternalistic environment in which they live and the limited resources for spending on education.

Intervention Details

The study was carried out among 41 schools in Lusaka, Zambia, with 3,146 girls in the eighth grade of primary school, a standard age between 13 and 14 years old and the period with the highest school dropout rate. These schools were large enough in number of students to allow randomization among their students, in addition, participants had approval from their parents or guardians to participate. Then, 12 schools were randomly separated and did not receive any program (pure control group). The remaining 29 schools were selected to apply the treatments, dividing their students into three mutually exclusive groups: control, safe space and negotiation.

The control group would only participate in the program later. The program applied to the negotiation group had 6 training sessions of two hours each, included activities such as group discussion, narratives, games and classic texts from negotiation literature and was entirely taught by women. Attendance was high, marked by an average of 4.8 of the 6 possible sessions. The classes aimed to make the teenagers understand their potential to affect the decisions of others without violating cultural norms or disrespecting their elders. The main factor was to recognize situations that would lead to gains for all parties and propose alternatives without confronting the person responsible, that is, focusing on cooperation instead of bargaining. The safe space group, in turn, was designed to have the same individual training effects as the negotiation group, but without teaching negotiation skills. It had the same number of classes, with the same advisors, but it would not have the negotiation part of its activities.

Based on the program design described above, negotiation training would help adolescents understand the decision-making process of those in charge and help them find opportunities for improvement for everyone. Individual empowerment, on the other hand, would subject parents to a mentality in favor of women and could increase the bias in favor of daughters. Furthermore, time spent in an environment with only other girls under female leadership could influence the young girl's ideal role models and impact decisions such as preventing pregnancy, completing school, entering the job market, pursuing a professional career, and compliance. regarding cultural norms. A survey with the young women and their guardians was conducted after 3 and 4 months of the program to identify changes in the daughter's behavior at home.

Methodology Details

The participant selection method and the program design allow the measurement of the program's impact, isolating the effects of both individual empowerment and the teaching of negotiation techniques. The results related to education were estimated in the 3 years following the program through the number of enrollments and study shift. Enrollment measures the number of students who registered in the ninth, tenth and eleventh years of school, and morning teaching is considered to be of higher quality when compared to the afternoon period in Zambia.

By randomizing the choice of participating schools and students, it is possible to compare the average results of the groups that received some treatment (negotiation or individual empowerment) with the control and pure control groups or between them. Other information such as socioeconomic characteristics of the students, language proficiency, age, ethnicity and the schools where they study are analyzed together so that the extracted effect is not confused with any other relevant factor. Therefore, the difference between the groups in the variables studied can, in fact, be attributed to the program applied.

Results

The results of the exercise explained above point to a positive effect between negotiation and enrollment numbers, with even greater effects after the transition to secondary education. The negotiation treatment increases enrollment in the tenth and eleventh grades by between 3.5 and 4.4 percentage points, about a 10% increase. The greater effect in secondary education is in line with the high dropout rate at the end of primary education (ninth year) and reveals a lasting impact. As for the space group, the effect on the registration number was inconclusive, it cannot be ruled out that the result is different from zero or equal to that of the negotiation group.

As for being able to enroll in the morning shift, the teenagers who participated in the negotiation group increased their chances. In the eleventh year, this group had an increase of 4 percentage points in the probability of attending morning school, which represents a 16% higher value when compared to the control group. The explanation for this result comes from the hypothesis that some girls with aptitude suffered external restrictions, such as financial ones, and managed to overcome this disadvantage due to treatment. The result for the safe space group is close to zero and, this time, conclusively different from the negotiation group.

Finally, the survey carried out with those responsible after the end of the program identified changes in the adolescents' behavior with negotiation training. Young women were considered more respectful and cared more about all members of the household, consistent with the idea of ​​increased cooperation and reciprocity. Comparatively, the daughters did not become more impulsive or had difficulty controlling their behavior, that is, the negotiation did not negatively affect the adolescents' conduct in relation to respect for those responsible. Furthermore, the domestic tasks performed by the young women in the negotiation group were carried out mainly on Fridays, a day less likely to require school work or studying for exams.

Public Policy Lessons

Based on the results presented, it can be concluded that the two treatments act differently on the students. Teaching negotiation techniques, a non-cognitive skill, proved to be relevant so that adolescents could overcome their financial and cultural restrictions to permanently increase the number of school enrollments and investment in education. Thus, in addition to not being associated with any negative changes in the behavior of young women, negotiation training could be included as a mandatory part of school curricula.

Reference

ASHRAF, Nava; BAU, Natalie; LOW, Corinne; MCGINN, Kathleen. "Negotiating a Better Future: How Interpersonal Skills Facilitate Intergenerational Investment". The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Volume 135, Issue 2, May 2020, Pages 1095–1151, 2020.