Are Gender Differences in Performance Innate or Socially Mediated?1

To explain persistent gender gaps in market outcomes, a lab experimental literature explores whether women and men have innate differences in ability (or attitudes or preferences), and a separate field-based literature studies discrimination against women in market settings. We posit that even if women have innate ability that is comparable to that of men, their relative performance may suffer in the market if the task requires them to interact with others in society, and they are subject to discrimination in those interactions. We test these ideas using a large-scale field experiment in 142 Malawian villages where men or women were randomly assigned the task of learning about a new agricultural technology, and then communicating it to others to convince them to adopt. Even though female communicators learn and retain the new information better, and those taught by women experience higher farm yields, the women are not as successful at teaching or convincing others to adopt. Micro-data on individual interactions from 4000 farmers in these villages suggest that other farmers perceive female communicators to be less able, and pay less attention to the women’s messages. 1 Corresponding authors: Florence Kondylis ([email protected]) and Mushfiq Mobarak ([email protected]). This draft benefited from comments from Manuel Bagues, Esther Duflo, David Evans, Arianna Legovini, Isaac Mbiti, David Rorhbach, Gil Shapira, Daniel Stein, and seminar participants at the 2013 World Bank Annual Meetings, IFPRI, DECRG, JPAL-Europe Labor Conference, UC-Merced and Cornell University. Siyao Zhu provided superb research assistance. Generous funding from the World Bank Gender Action Plan and Research Support budget, the Millennium Challenge Corporations made this research possible, as well as support from the World Bank Development Impact Evaluation unit and Innovations for Poverty Action in Malawi. The views expressed in this manuscript do not reflect the views of the World Bank. All errors are our own. 1