Experimental economics platform

The experimental economics platform developed by GAEL is used for teaching and research purposes, solely within the framework of GAEL members' activities (it is not open to the outside world). It is both a standard experimental economics platform, used to test theories, and a "field experiment" platform designed to be anchored in the real world. In its field-experiment version, it is mainly used in consumer research: the subjects recruited are "real people" (not students) and the tasks they have to perform are concrete (e.g. choosing and buying products).

The platform includes

• an experimental room (equipped with 36 PCs, 16 barcode scanners, 2 video projectors, an information screen for the experimentalist, etc.), a back office (management server and experimental control station), a payment gate and a product storage room;
• a mobile laboratory comprising 30 tablets, a wifi networking terminal and a portable server;
• a web interface for subject registration;
• a collaborative website for researchers;
• a server for data archiving.

Overview of platform activities

• Over the past four years, the platform has been used to conduct experiments as part of 9 research programs, and to meet three main objectives: observation of individual and collective behavior ; public policy and market design; and measuring customer value.
• A total of 145 sessions were organized, involving 2012 students or "real people".
• Recognizing the need for better organization of our work due to (i) our collective nature, which involves a diversity of professions and skills, and (ii) the growing number of experiments, we launched a quality initiative with the support of INRA's SAE2 department. For the time being, this approach has focused on two processes : management of collected data (drafting of a charter, a guide to good practice and a self-assessment tool) ; subject recruitment (website, mutual commitment charter, creation of a "subject" database declared to the CNIL).