Stereotypes or prejudice: Behavioral evidence of gender discrimination from rural India

Discriminatory social norms drive high levels of gender inequality in India. However, there is a paucity of evidence on how gender discrimination manifests in economic decision-making with real payoffs in a rural, underdeveloped setting. In this paper, I present a lab-in-the-field experiment using incentivized trust and dictator games to distinguish between statistical and taste-based gender discrimination. Negative stereotypes that manifest as lower trust is interpreted as statistical discrimination. Prejudice that manifests as lower trust and social preferences is interpreted as taste-based discrimination. Next, I evaluate whether a behavioral nudge can influence discriminating individuals’ preferences over gender versus previous trustworthiness. The evaluation nudge tests whether moving from separate (single-choice) to joint (multiple-choice) evaluation setting triggers a shift from gender-biased to payoff maximizing decision-making. Results indicate that participants demonstrate statistical discrimination. Signalling higher trustworthiness leads to gender unbiased decision-making under joint evaluation, but not under separate evaluation. • Discriminatory social norms drives gender inequality, however, there is a paucity of evidence on discrimination in economic decision-making in a rural, underdeveloped setting. • This lab-in-the-field experiment uses incentivized trust and dictator games to identify the magnitude and discriminate between statistical and taste-based gender discrimination. • Negative stereotypes that manifest as low trust is interpreted as statistical discrimination, while prejudice that manifests as lower trust and social preferences is interpreted as taste-based discrimination. • Next, this paper tests a behavioural nudge that tests whether moving from separate (single-choice) to joint (multiple-choice) evaluation setting triggers a shift from gender- biased to pay-off maximizing decision-making. • Results indicate that participants demonstrate statistical discrimination and signalling higher trustworthiness leads to gender unbiased decision-making under joint evaluation, but not under separate evaluation.