Hostname: page-component-7b7567c8c-wxvwp Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-11-14T19:51:10.136Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Preference intensities and risk aversion in school choice: a laboratory experiment

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 March 2025

Flip Klijn,
Joana Pais and
Marc Vorsatz
Flip Klijn*
Affiliation:
Institute for Economic Analysis (CSIC) and Barcelona GSE, Campus UAB, 08193 Bellaterra (Barcelona), Spain
Joana Pais*
Affiliation:
ISEG/Technical University of Lisbon and UECE–Research Unit on Complexity and Economics, Rua Miguel Lupi, 20, 1249-078 Lisboa, Portugal
Marc Vorsatz*
Affiliation:
Departamento de Análisis Económico II, UNED, Paseo Senda del Rey 11, 28040 Madrid, SpainFundación de Estudios de Economía Aplicada (FEDEA), Calle Jorge Juan 46, 28001 Madrid, Spain
*
flip.klijn@iae.csic.es
jpais@iseg.utl.pt
mvorsatz@cee.uned.es
Get accessRights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

We experimentally investigate in the laboratory prominent mechanisms that are employed in school choice programs to assign students to public schools and study how individual behavior is influenced by preference intensities and risk aversion. Our main results show that (a) the Gale–Shapley mechanism is more robust to changes in cardinal preferences than the Boston mechanism independently of whether individuals can submit a complete or only a restricted ranking of the schools and (b) subjects with a higher degree of risk aversion are more likely to play “safer” strategies under the Gale–Shapley but not under the Boston mechanism. Both results have important implications for enrollment planning and the possible protection risk averse agents seek.

Keywords

School choiceRisk aversionPreference intensitiesLaboratory experimentGale–Shapley mechanismBoston mechanismEfficiencyStabilityConstrained choice

JEL classification

D78: Positive Analysis of Policy Formulation and ImplementationC78: Bargaining Theory • Matching TheoryI20: GeneralC91: Laboratory, Individual BehaviorC92: Laboratory, Group Behavior

Information

Type
Article
Information
Experimental Economics , Volume 16 , Issue 1: Mechanisms and Methodology , March 2013, pp. 1 - 22
Copyright
Copyright © 2012 Economic Science Association

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

Footnotes

Electronic Supplementary Material The online version of this article (doi:https://doi.org/10.1007/s10683-012-9329-5) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

We are very grateful for comments and suggestions from the Editor, two referees, Eyal Ert, Bettina Klaus, Muriel Niederle, Al Roth, and the seminar audiences in Alicante, Braga, Évora, Maastricht, and Málaga. F. Klijn gratefully acknowledges a research fellowship from Harvard Business School for academic year 2009–2010 when he was visiting HBS and the first draft of the paper was written. He also gratefully acknowledges support from Plan Nacional I+D+i (ECO2008-04784 and ECO2011-29847), Generalitat de Catalunya (SGR2009-01142), and the Consolider-Ingenio 2010 (CSD2006-00016) program. J. Pais gratefully acknowledges financial support from Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia under project reference no. PTDC/EGE-ECO/113403/2009. M. Vorsatz gratefully acknowledges financial support from the Spanish Ministry of Education and Science through the project ECO2009-07530.

References

Abdulkadiroğlu, A., & Sönmez, T. (2003). School choice: a mechanism design approach. American Economic Review, 93(3), 729–747. 10.1257/000282803322157061CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Abdulkadiroğlu, A., Pathak, P., & Roth, A. (2005). The New York city high school match. American Economic Review, Papers and Proceedings, 95(2), 364–367. 10.1257/000282805774670167CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Abdulkadiroğlu, A., Pathak, P., Roth, A., & Sönmez, T. (2005). The Boston public schools match. American Economic Review, Papers and Proceedings, 95(2), 368–371. 10.1257/000282805774669637CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Abdulkadiroğlu, A., Pathak, P., & Roth, A. (2009). Strategy-proofness versus efficiency in matching with indifferences: redesigning the NYC high school match. American Economic Review, 99(5), 1954–1978. 10.1257/aer.99.5.1954CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Abdulkadiroğlu, A., Che, Y.-K., & Yasuda, Y. (2011). Resolving conflicting preferences in school choice: the Boston mechanism reconsidered. American Economic Review, 101(1), 399–410. 10.1257/aer.101.1.399CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barberà, S., & Dutta, B. (1982). Implementability via protective equilibria. Journal of Mathematical Economics, 10(1), 49–65. 10.1016/0304-4068(82)90005-2CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barberà, S., & Dutta, B. (1995). Protective behavior in matching models. Games and Economic Behavior, 8(2), 281–296. 10.1016/S0899-8256(05)80002-8CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Calsamiglia, C., Haeringer, G., & Klijn, F. (2009). Constrained school choice: an experimental study. American Economic Review, 100(4), 1860–1874. 10.1257/aer.100.4.1860CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chen, Y., & Sönmez, T. (2006). School choice: an experimental study. Journal of Economic Theory, 127(1), 202–231. 10.1016/j.jet.2004.10.006CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dubins, L., & Freedman, D. (1981). Machiavelli and the Gale–Shapley algorithm. The American Mathematical Monthly, 88(7), 485–494. 10.2307/2321753CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ergin, H., & Sönmez, T. (2006). Games of school choice under the Boston mechanism. Journal of Public Economics, 90(1–2), 215–237. 10.1016/j.jpubeco.2005.02.002CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Featherstone, C., & Niederle, M. (2008). Ex ante efficiency in school choice mechanisms: an experimental investigation. Working paper, Stanford University.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fischbacher, U. (2007). Z-tree: Zurich toolbox for ready-made economic experiments. Experimental Economics, 10(2), 171–178. 10.1007/s10683-006-9159-4CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gale, D., & Shapley, L. (1962). College admissions and the stability of marriage. The American Mathematical Monthly, 69(1), 9–15. 10.2307/2312726CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Greiner, B. (2004). The online recruitment system ORSEE 2.0—a guide for the organization of experiments in economics. Working Paper Series in Economics 10, University of Cologne.Google Scholar
Holt, C., & Laury, S. (2002). Risk aversion and incentive effects. American Economic Review, 92(5), 1644–1655. 10.1257/000282802762024700CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Miralles, A. (2008). School choice: the case for the Boston mechanism. Working paper, Boston University.Google Scholar
Nicolò, A., & Rodríguez-Álvarez, C. (2012). Transplant quality and patients’ preferences in paired kidney exchange. Games and Economic Behavior, 74(1), 299–310. 10.1016/j.geb.2011.05.009CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pais, J., & Pintér, Á. (2008). School choice and information: an experimental study on matching mechanisms. Games and Economic Behavior, 64(1), 303–328. 10.1016/j.geb.2008.01.008CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Roth, A. (1982). The economics of matching: stability and incentives. Mathematics of Operations Research, 7(4), 617–628. 10.1287/moor.7.4.617CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Supplementary material: File

Klijn et al. supplementary material

Klijn et. al. supplementary material
Download Klijn et al. supplementary material(File)
File 1.3 MB