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  5. Discrimination in the Formation of Academic Networks: A Field Experiment on #EconTwitter

American Economic Review: Insights

ISSN 2640-205X (Print) | ISSN 2640-2068 (Online)

Discrimination in the Formation of Academic Networks: A Field Experiment on #EconTwitter

  • Nicolás Ajzenman
  • Bruno Ferman
  • Pedro C. Sant'Anna
American Economic Review: Insights (Forthcoming)

Abstract

This paper documents discrimination in the formation of professional networks among academic economists. Specifically, we created 80 human-like bot accounts that claim to be PhD students, differing in three key characteristics: gender (male or female), race (Black or White), and university affiliation (top- or lower-ranked). The bots randomly followed 6,920 users in the #Econ- Twitter community. Follow-back rates were 12% higher for White students compared to Black students, 21% higher for students from top-ranked universities compared to those from lower-ranked institutions, and 25% higher for female compared to male students. Notably, the racial gap persists even among students from top-ranked institutions.

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