The Effect of Social Capital on Group Loan Repayment: Evidence from Field Experiments
通过南非和亚美尼亚的田野实验，发现团体成员间的个人信任和社会同质性比普遍社会信任或熟人关系更能促进团体贷款偿还，且存在互惠效应。
An important question to microfinance is the relevance of existing social capital in target communities to the performance of group lending. This research presents evidence from field experiments in South Africa and Armenia, in which subjects participate in trust and microfinance games. We present evidence that personal trust between group members and social homogeneity are more important to group loan repayment than general societal trust or acquaintanceship between members. We also find some evidence of reciprocity: those who have been helped by other group members in the past are more likely to contribute in the future. Copyright 2007 The Author(s). Journal compilation Royal Economic Society 2007.