Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/339358 
Year of Publication: 
2026
Series/Report no.: 
Working Paper No. 485
Publisher: 
University of Zurich, Department of Economics, Zurich
Abstract: 
We study how incarceration experience shapes preferences for criminal justice policies. In collaboration with a newly opened prison, we conducted a randomized field experiment that o!ered citizens the opportunity to experience up to two days of incarceration, closely replicating the real-life journey of inmates. Providing citizens with a chance to gain firsthand incarceration leads to a significant shift in punitive attitudes, with participants becoming less supportive of harsh criminal justice policies and donating more money to organizations advocating more moderate justice policies. Although individuals overestimated the wellbeing of actual prisoners, the intervention did not alter these beliefs. This suggests that the observed changes in policy preferences are driven more by personal experience than by revised beliefs about the burden of confinement. By randomizing institutional exposure outside the laboratory, our study highlights the causal role of personal experience in the formation of policy preferences.
Subjects: 
Incarceration
Field Experiment
Personal Experience
Criminal Justice Policy
Punitive Attitudes
Prison
JEL: 
C93
D83
K14
P37
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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