Breakfast at School: a First Look at the Role of Time and Location for Participation and Nutritional Intake
利用小学生个体面板数据，通过三种实验设计分离时间和地点效应，发现延长在食堂的强制时间可提高参与率约20%，而改为教室服务则额外增加35%-45%，但两种干预对总营养摄入无显著影响。
Abstract Participation in the subsidized School Breakfast Program has traditionally been unsatisfactory. Universally free breakfast service in the classroom has boosted participation, but is not financially feasible for many schools. Furthermore, it is unclear to what extent participation under the standard cafeteria setting is hampered due to insufficient time to eat. This study separately identifies time and location effects using a unique, individual‐level panel data set of elementary school students under three experimental treatments: original setup in the cafeteria, original setup plus ten minutes of mandatory presence in the cafeteria, and in‐classroom service. We find that the extra time plus the fixed location effect in the cafeteria increases average daily participation by approximately 20%, while the transition to classroom implementation adds another 35%–45% for the typical student. We also collect detailed data on nutritional intake, and find that, in total, neither treatment has a significant effect on consumption compared to the baseline.