European Central Bank research by Bartosz Maćkowiak presents a rational inattention framework to analyse “information provision” survey experiments and what measured treatment effects imply about how people process information and adjust beliefs and actions outside surveys. The model embeds an unexpected survey that provides information about an underlying state (such as inflation) and allows participants to choose how much attention to devote to it when attention is cheaper during the survey than in daily life. The paper shows that when individuals pay some attention both outside and during the survey, the survey treatment effect can fall as the importance of being informed rises, because greater baseline attention in daily life reduces the incremental impact of the survey. If people do not pay attention outside the survey because daily-life attention is much costlier or information is unavailable, the treatment effect instead increases with the importance of being informed, making information availability central to interpretation. The framework is used to rationalise findings such as smaller inflation-information treatment effects when inflation is high, stronger effects among poorly informed but attentive respondents in interest-rate surveys, and systematically smaller treatment effects on actions than on beliefs. For central bank communication, the model distinguishes between communication that expands publicly available information (for example, policy rate change announcements) versus communication that restates existing information either in a salient, attention-reducing way (for example, media campaigns) or in a regular, non-salient format (for example, routine press conference discussions), with effectiveness predicted to vary across audiences depending on their baseline attention and the decision-relevance of the information.
European Central Bank 2025-09-25
European Central Bank research models survey information treatments under rational inattention and draws implications for central bank communication
European Central Bank research by Bartosz Maćkowiak introduces a rational inattention framework to analyze survey experiments on information provision and its effects on belief and action adjustments. The study finds that survey treatment effects vary based on individuals' baseline attention levels and the cost of attention, with implications for central bank communication strategies. The model suggests that communication effectiveness depends on whether it expands new information or restates existing information, impacting different audiences variably.