Research
Publications
Behavioral charity: Third-party ratings of nonprofits as salience and heuristics
Abstract
Financial disclosure through tax returns is the primary regulatory mechanism for holding nonprofits accountable to donors in the USA. The assumption that donors will make rational decisions using disclosed information when giving to nonprofits is central to this regulation. But what if they rely on mental shortcuts instead? This study examines how donors respond to a third-party nonprofit rating that is simple, unverified, and based on self-reported data. Using a five-year panel dataset covering over a million nonprofit-year records, we find that even these basic ratings have a significant impact on donation behavior. Donors use ratings via two mental shortcuts. First, ratings increase a nonprofit’s salience, boosting donations by 7%. Second, donors process higher ratings as a mental accounting shortcut, giving up to 34% more to the top-rated nonprofits. The findings suggest the limits of information disclosure alone in making nonprofits accountable to donors.
Ethical and culturally responsive biomarker research in the majority world
Abstract
Studies of human development in the majority world rarely include biomarkers, especially outside research on nutrition and public health. Yet including the “bio” in bioecological has enormous potential to advance a global developmental science, reflective of the diversity found in most of the world’s population. In this article, we discuss concerns related to the ethics and feasibility of conducting biomarker research in developmental studies in the majority world. We weigh these concerns against the potential benefits of advancing understanding of developmental mechanisms and processes, and how human development unfolds across cultures and contexts. In doing so, we draw on prior research and the authors’ experiences developing and implementing studies that included biomarkers across multiple majority world contexts, and we suggest ways to explore various biomarker methods for their cultural and logistical feasibility. Combining rich data on the developmental ecosystem with biomarkers will enable scientific advancements relevant to the design of policies and interventions.
From annual to medium-term budgetary framework: Evolution of public financial management in Bangladesh
Abstract
The financial management of the Bangladesh government was in a precarious position in the late 1980s. The budget size increased manifold compared to that of the 1970s, ominously relying on development assistance that concurrently meted out feeble fiscal management. To ameliorate this creeping fiscal position, the Government undertook an array of financial management reforms, most of which came through the implementation of the Medium-Term Budgetary Framework (MTBF). Reforms in budget forecasting, budget presentation, linkage between the budget and medium-term macroeconomic goals, and modernization of accounting and auditing were major components targeted and transformed in the reform process. In this paper, I provide a historical overview of the budgeting, accounting, and auditing processes before the 1990s to explicate the necessity for the reforms brought about under the aegis of the MTBF. I then elaborate on the major reforms in budgetary, accounting, and auditing practices introduced under the MTBF.
Salience in Email Recruitment
Abstract
Text reminders and mailed flyers with behaviorally informed messages are regularly used in public sector communication. Mass email blasts are another inexpensive option to communicate with target audiences. Evidence suggests that email recipients may have become habituated to “spam” and frequently discard these messages before they read them. Thus, email may be less effective than other communication forms because they never reach their intended audience. Little research has been completed on the efficacy of these email messages, however. This study uses a randomized controlled trial to examine which email format, a letter with university logos signed by a university official or an informational flyer with a photograph, is the more salient option when recruiting for a teacher training program designed for diverse, underrepresented students. Our findings show that emails in the form of an official letter from university officials were more effective at increasing email openings and, subsequently, clicks on the program website link compared to email messages written as flyers. Initial emails sent in the fall were less successful at driving recipients to the website than reminder emails sent later. Messages emphasizing the long-term career opportunity were more successful at pushing recipients to open the follow-up message.
Disaster risk reduction for whom? The gap between centrally planned disaster management programs and people’s risk perception and adaptation
Abstract
Integration of Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) and Climate Change Adaptation (CCA) is gaining popularity to address the increasing threat of climate change. People living in high disaster-prone impoverished areas can benefit from risk reduction interventions and subsequent adaptation of new technologies and behavior if those interventions diminish the perceived risk of disaster. Perceived risk of disaster plays an important role in influencing adaptive behavior. Disaster risk reduction interventions therefore can be benefitted from inclusive local consultation during the planning and implementation of the risk reduction interventions by taking local people’s perceived risk of disaster into account. We studied a national-level disaster risk reduction program called ‘The comprehensive Disaster Management Program (CDMP)’ in Bangladesh to understand the linkage between risk reduction interventions, perceived risk of disaster, and adaptation. Following a mixed-method approach, we collected quantitative administrative data, interviewed local people, and conducted Focus Group Discussions in two disaster-prone neighboring coastal unions of Bangladesh. We have found that if risk reduction interventions designed by the central government are not aligned with the perceived risk of the local people, the implementation of these interventions does not reduce perceived risk significantly, and consequently, people do not adopt new technologies and behavior to increase their resilience to climate change shocks. Furthermore, people’s valuation of a risk reduction intervention in reducing the perceived risk of disasters does not change after an actual disaster takes place insinuating the relative accuracy and robustness of local people’s assessment of such interventions. We also found that risk reduction interventions implemented in a holistic way addressing multiple sources of risks can reduce perceived risk significantly. Lastly, we demonstrated that reducing perceived risk is a necessary condition but is not sufficient to encourage adaptation. Our study can contribute to improving the design and implementation of large-scale risk-reduction interventions implemented at the community level.
Impact of community masking on COVID-19: A cluster randomized trial in Bangladesh
Abstract
Even in places where it is obligatory, people tend to optimistically overstate their compliance for mask wearing. How then can we persuade more of the population at large to act for the greater good? Abaluck et al. undertook a large, cluster-randomized trial in Bangladesh involving hundreds of thousands of people (although mostly men) over a 2-month period. Colored masks of various construction were handed out free of charge, accompanied by a range of mask-wearing promotional activities inspired by marketing research. Using a grassroots network of volunteers to help conduct the study and gather data, the authors discovered that mask wearing averaged 13.3% in villages where no interventions took place but increased to 42.3% in villages where in-person interventions were introduced. Villages where in-person reinforcement of mask wearing occurred also showed a reduction in reporting COVID-like illness, particularly in high-risk individuals.
‘Do Poor People’s Dreams Ever Come True?’ Educational Aspirations and Lived Realities in Urban Slums in Dhaka, Bangladesh
Abstract
Bangladesh has made progress in advancing adolescent girls’ education, but there remain substantial evidence gaps around age and gender differences in motivations, retention, and access to education for adolescents living in urban slums. This article draws on quantitative and qualitative data collected in 2017 and 2018 by Gender and Adolescence: Global Evidence (GAGE) with adolescents aged 10–17 across three low-income areas in Dhaka to explore adolescent educational attainment, aspirations, and environmental factors that constrain both. We find high educational and professional aspirations among adolescents and their parents, with parental support being an important predictor of both current enrolment and adolescent aspirations. Location is also an important predictor of adolescent aspirations and enrolment, highlighting the importance of infrastructure and services, integration into the city, and stability of the community (including schools and facilities), along with higher incomes and better employment opportunities for households.
Implementing a humanitarian needs assessment framework for early childhood development: Informing intervention design for displaced Rohingya communities in Bangladesh
Abstract
Recent literature focused on education in conflict-affected settings firmly establishes the link between early childhood interventions, poverty reduction, and the effects of adverse childhood experiences, particularly for those exposed to violent conflict. A key factor of effective interventions targeting young children and their families, and thus the long-term sustainability of behavior change, is how those interventions are received by local populations. Despite the importance of understanding local perspectives, needs assessments are often deprioritized when the focus is on meeting the immediate need for safety, food, water, and shelter. In the absence of a needs assessment, programming is developed without understanding the key priorities and motivations of the communities served. Given that the average length of protracted refugee situations is now more than 20 years, early childhood development programming designed without local perspectives brings with it the possibility of long-term repercussions, little community buy-in, and, consequently, limited to no impact. Therefore, the long-term costs of not doing needs assessments in humanitarian contexts are likely to far exceed the initial investments in conducting such research. In acknowledgment of these opportunities and constraints, this article presents a framework for conducting a needs assessment in a humanitarian setting, along with illustrative findings that underscore the value of seeking greater understanding of a community before designing early childhood development programming. Using a needs assessment to inform the design of an early childhood development intervention for displaced Rohingya communities living in Bangladesh, this article uses the design of that assessment to provide a framework for operationalizing needs assessments in humanitarian settings.
Assessment of excess mortality and household income in rural Bangladesh during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020
Abstract
Importance A slow or incomplete civil registry makes it impossible to determine excess mortality due to COVID-19 and difficult to inform policy.
Objective To quantify the association of the COVID-19 pandemic with excess mortality and household income in rural Bangladesh in 2020.
Design, Setting, and Participants This repeated survey study is based on an in-person census followed by 2 rounds of telephone calls. Data were collected from a sample of 135 villages within a densely populated 350-km2 rural area of Bangladesh. Mortality rates were modeled by bayesian multilevel regression and aggregated by poststratification. Data analysis was performed from February to April 2021.
Results A total of 276 deaths were reported between February and the end of October 2020, slightly below the 289 reported for the same population in 2019. After adjustment, 2020 mortality changed by −8% (95% CI, −21% to 7%). In May 2020, salaried primary income earners reported a 40% decrease in monthly income, and self-employed earners reported a 60% decrease, with only a small recovery by November 2020.
Conclusions and Relevance All-cause mortality was lower in 2020 compared with 2019. Restrictions imposed by the government may have limited the scale of the COVID-19 pandemic in rural areas, although economic data suggest these restrictions need to be accompanied by expanded welfare programs.
No one left behind: Using mixed-methods research to identify and learn from socially marginalised adolescents in low-and middle-income countries
Abstract
This article describes the mixed-methods approach used by the Gender and Adolescence: Global Evidence (GAGE) research programme. It discusses how qualitative and quantitative methods can be used both in isolation and combined to learn about the lives of adolescents in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), focusing on the methodological and ethical approaches used to reach socially marginalised adolescents (including adolescents with disabilities, adolescents not in school, adolescent refugees, adolescents living in urban slums, adolescents who married as children, and adolescent mothers). We reflect on the implementation of the GAGE conceptual framework, discussing its strengths and weaknesses, and the challenges to promoting inclusive and genuinely mixed-methods research practices. While these methods have been adapted in the countries where research was undertaken, the conceptual framework provides a common methodological approach, utilising an intersectional lens. We show how mixed-methods approaches can contribute to the knowledge base on research with socially marginalised adolescent girls and boys globally, serving as an important resource for future research with young people in LMICs.
The effect of minimum wage on employment growth: The case of ready-made garment industry in Bangladesh
Abstract
Contention over industrial wages between the factory owners and laborers is a driving force for much labor unrest in Bangladesh in the last decade. Owners often argue that enforcing a minimum wage that exceeds the market-clearing wage will reduce export competitiveness and will result in layoffs and closing of factories. Taking advantage of the new minimum wage law of 2013, we measured the impact of this wage increase on labor expenditure, employment, production volume, export volume, and total revenue, using panel data of 94 RMG factories covering 2012 to 2016. We used a two-way fixed-effects, pre-post model. We observe that labor expenditure increased by 19 percent after the enactment of the law. At the same time, the production volume increased by 21%, exports increased by 17%, and revenue increased by 23%. We did not see any significant change in employment, indicating that the new law increased revenue earning for factories through increased labor productivity.
Urban giant syndrome of Dhaka city: Revisiting two-sector theories for urban policymaking
Abstract
Continuous expansion of Dhaka city and the simultaneous degradation of amenities, such as pollution, traffic congestion, and unreliable provision of utilities, provides a puzzle for development policymakers. Using economies of agglomeration, we trace this puzzle to the problem of centralization and the failure to create other comparable cities. Dhaka remains the hub of most industrial factories that attracted both forward and backward linkages. To protect these investments, the government keeps investing in transport and utilities to provide a bare minimum sustenance. Despite the degradation of amenities, Dhaka remains the most attractive place for organizing production activities and employment that attract new migrants from rural areas. The failure to decentralize government services and create other competitive cities maintains Dhaka’s competitive advantage for organizing industrial production.
Good governance project in Nepal: In search of a demand-side good governance theory for evaluation
Abstract
This paper attempted to develop a demand-side good governance (GG) framework to evaluate GG interventions aiming to empowering the people. Increasing and nurturing social capital, establishing a vibrant and sustainable network of civic associations, and generating voluntary contribution for civic initiatives are three core components that demand-side GG projects should incorporate. Using this framework, we showed that the GG project in Nepal completely ignored the third component and therefore bears the risk of being unsustainable in the long run.
Accountability for public expenditure in Bangladesh: The principal-agent problem and role of the Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General
Abstract
While administrative accountability is a key to good governance, there is a dilemma concerning which aspects of it should be given special emphasis. This dilemma arises in part from the alternative perspectives of bureaucratic management and principal-agent theory. The former provides for accountability through hierarchical control, written rules and procedures, and bureaucratic impersonality. The latter, by contrast, heralds the value of contractual relationships and the resulting incentives that lead actors to respond in particular ways. This article addresses these perspectives with reference to the public expenditure accountability system in Bangladesh as a principal-agent problem between the executive, bureaucracy and the parliament. A significant element of the problem is that the Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General has limited capacity to enhance the flow of credible public financial information as a means of reducing the information asymmetry between principals and agents.
Combatting political and administrative corruption in Bangladesh: Institutionalizing accountability and transparency in public domain
Abstract
This book chapter provides an overview of the history of political and administrative corruption in Bangladesh and the institutional evolution of anti-corruption laws and policies. It demonstrates that political and administrative corruption has been pervasive since the British period. However, it has alarmingly increased since 1990s, at a time when the country invested significantly in building anti-corruption institutions. We argue that the problem lies not in the deficiency of law or institutions, but in the prevailing administrative and political culture that weakens enforcement.
Civil service system and reforms in Bangladesh
Abstract
Bangladesh inherited a relatively modernized civil service system that was elitist in orientation, training, power, prestige, and pay, as well as being hierarchically disciplined and strictly rule-bound, and having functionally specialized cadre services, in spite of being dominated by generalists (Khan 1980). Institutional permanence, technical expertise, administrative experience, and the organizational network of the bureaucracy during the British and Pakistan periods very much outpaced the level of political development that politicians accepted bureaucratic hegemony in policy-making and implementation.
Performance appraisal system of Bangladesh civil service: An analysis of its efficacy
Abstract
Performance appraisal plays a crucial role in maintaining a high-quality and competitive workforce, but has been ignored so far from the civil service reform agenda in Bangladesh. At present, an Annual Confidential Report (ACR) that was introduced during the Pakistan period and retained with minor modifications is used to measure performance. The prevailing gross inefficiency of the Bangladesh Civil Service gives the impression that this appraisal system is poorly functioning. This paper articulates the difficulties in designing a good appraisal system in the public sector and provides a theoretical framework arguing that the ‘goodness’ of a PA system should be seen in its capacity to meet its predetermined objectives instead of counting on the so-called infallible psychometric properties. A certain degree of validity, reliability, and perceived fairness is essential for an appraisal system to be efficacious. The paper then analyzes the historical development of the current ACR of Bangladesh Civil Service and its components to measure its validity, reliability, and perceived fairness. The paper found that though the current ACR holds some degree of fairness, it significantly lacks in validity as well as reliability, and therefore is deficient in meeting its stated objectives.
Public policy process in Bangladesh: Rhetoric or precondition for development?
Abstract
This paper describes the legal and institutional evolution of policymaking in Bangladesh.
Managing public administration in Bangladesh
Abstract
This book chapter describes the institutional structure of public administration and its evolution in Bangladesh. We describe the central and field administration and the coordination process, linkage with the political institutions, and major challenges.
Under Review
From Evidence to Policy Action: Experimental Evidence on Decentralized Policy Communication in Bangladesh
Abstract
Why do public officials engage with credible evidence but fail to act on it? We argue that evidence communication must address two organizational constraints. Officials need cues that a proposal carries institutional standing and practical information that helps them organize local action. We test this argument in a three-arm randomized field experiment involving Upazila Nirbahi Officer offices in 300 Bangladeshi upazilas. The offices received the same evidence briefs from a research organization, through a government-sponsored communication bundle, or through the same government communication and briefs with a contextualized implementation package. We measure engagement as recontact with the sender and recorded policy uptake as formal project approval documented through approval and budget records. Government-sponsored communication increased recontact from 5 to 24 percent (p = 0.000112), but the 3-percentage-point increase in uptake was imprecise (p = 0.251). Adding implementation support did not detectably increase recontact (5 percentage points, p = 0.426), but it increased uptake from 5 to 16 percent (p = 0.011). The pattern is consistent with institutional sponsorship increasing the administrative relevance of evidence and implementation support reducing implementation uncertainty to action. These findings show that evidence communication operates through organizational conditions, not only through the transmission of credible research.
Failure to Count? Behavioral Explanations for Mandatory Low-Cost Collective Action Failures
Abstract
Why do citizens fail to contribute to collective goods even when contribution is legally required, nearly costless, and takes only minutes? This study examines census nonresponse as a low-cost collective action failure in which structural barriers have largely been removed, leaving psychological frictions as the binding constraint. One-third of U.S. households do not self-respond to the decennial census despite decades of structural cost reduction, generating differential undercounts that distort political representation and federal funding. We report results from a preregistered survey experiment with 1,500 prior 2020 Census nonrespondents. Five behaviorally informed messages are tested against a control condition. Loss framing and legal penalty salience significantly increase stated contribution intentions, while a neutral program-benefit message and a political representation message do not. A trust repair message reduces intentions through a mechanism consistent with psychological reactance rather than information processing. The findings suggest that behavioral barriers, not ideological or incentive misalignment, drive low-cost collective action failures, and that loss-framed messaging outperforms benefit and trust-repair appeals in census outreach.
Designing nonprofit success: A systematic review of board inputs and organizational performance
Abstract
I synthesize 78 studies from leading nonprofit and public administration journals to explain why research on board design choices, board effectiveness, and organizational performance yields inconsistent findings. The analysis reveals that empirical contradictions stem primarily from theoretical misalignment and measurement diversity rather than from methodological differences alone. Studies test fundamentally different causal propositions. Some researchers model direct effects of board inputs, assuming they are sufficient conditions, while others adopt the dominant mediated model (board design choices as inputs → board effectiveness as mediator → organizational performance as outcomes), treating inputs as necessary but not sufficient conditions requiring governance activation. Yet few studies articulate theoretical criteria for choosing between these specifications. Using Pearl’s causal framework, I argue that the causal role of any variable — input, mediator, moderator, or outcome — is not a fixed property but a function of the research question, and I demonstrate when each modeling approach is appropriate and when misspecification introduces bias. Empirically, board capital shows consistent positive effects across measurement approaches. Board size and diversity exhibit contingent effects depending on measurement. Process inputs, particularly strategic planning and oversight, demonstrate robust positive associations on both subjective and objective indicators, though objective tests remain limited for board development practices. I propose a research agenda emphasizing theoretical precision in specifying causal relationships, rigorous identification strategies, and measurement innovation to advance cumulative knowledge in nonprofit governance.
Stars over scores: Salience and the behavioral processing of performance-based charity ratings
Abstract
This study examines whether donors process Charity Navigator (CN) star ratings as rational shortcuts, using verified performance information, or as mental shortcuts driven by label salience. Exploiting CN’s deterministic star-rating thresholds in a regression discontinuity design with panel data on 45,520 nonprofit-year observations (2014–2018), we find significant donation discontinuities only at the 2→3 and 3→4 star transitions (τ ≈ 0.11–0.13, p < 0.05), with null effects at lower transitions. Within star tiers, continuous numerical scores exert no influence on contributions. Component-score RD estimates are uniformly near zero, and donors in a conflicting-signal subsample respond to the composite star rating even when financial and accountability scores diverge. Together, these results demonstrate that donors rely on the most salient categorical signal while ignoring freely accessible detailed performance information—consistent with salience-based behavioral processing rather than rational information integration.
Understanding community perspectives on religious education in conflict contexts: Findings from a refugee context in Cox’s Bazar
Abstract
The study explores how displaced communities navigate and view religious education within emergency and host-country settings, specifically focusing on the Rohingya refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh. In these highly volatile and dense humanitarian environments, education is heavily fractured, and formal schooling systems often conflict or overlap with community-led and traditional religious models.
Work in Progress
When mandates are not enough: Behavioral foundations of evidence-based policymaking
Artificial delegation: When administrators delegate more to AI than humans
Behavioral performance feedback: Can loss aversion drive administrative performance in low-resource settings?
Who coproduces? Machine learning for heterogeneity in behavioral coproduction
Bridging the great debates: Why do we need behavioral public administration?
Decomposing the heuristic value of nonprofit ratings: Performance signals, disclosure signals, and donor behavior
Evaluating a medically tailored grocery program for rural veteran population
Behavioral theory of state budgeting in the USA