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This paper analyzes a randomized experiment that uses novel strategies to promote handwashing with soap at critical times in Peru. It evaluates a large-scale intervention that includes a mass media provincial campaign and a district-level community component. The analysis finds that the mass media intervention alone had no significant effect on exposure to the handwashing promotion campaign messages, and therefore no effect on handwashing knowledge or handwashing behavior. In contrast, the community-level intervention, a more comprehensive intervention that included several community and school activities in addition to the communications campaign, was successful in reaching the target audience with handwashing promotion messages and in improving the knowledge of the treated population on appropriate handwashing behavior. Those improvements translated into higher self-reported and observed handwashing with soap at critical junctures. However, no significant improvements in the health of children under the age of five were observed. The results are consistent with earlier literature, which indicates that substantively changing behavior to improve health is a complex task requiring intensive and more personalized interventions.

Behavior change --- Disease Control & Prevention --- Handwashing --- Health Monitoring & Evaluation --- Housing & Human Habitats --- Hygiene --- Hygiene Promotion and Social Marketing --- Population Policies --- Randomized evaluation --- Water Supply and Sanitation

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Financial literacy programs are fast becoming a key ingredient in financial policy reform worldwide. Yet, what is financial literacy exactly and what do we know of its effectiveness? This paper collects insights from the literature thus far and summarizes global evidence on financial literacy, its correlates, and existing and upcoming causal investigations. The authors conclude with a synthesis of policy advice and practical suggestions for the way forward in this fast growing area of research.

Access & Equity in Basic Education --- Access to Finance --- Business Training --- Education for All --- Finance and Financial Sector Development --- Financial Capability --- Financial Literacy --- Primary Education --- Private Sector Development --- Randomized Evaluation

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Handwashing with soap, which has been shown to reduce diarrhea in young children by as much as 48 percent, is frequently mentioned as one of the most effective and inexpensive ways to save children's lives. Yet rates of handwashing remain very low throughout the world. Handwashing with soap campaigns are de rigueur in developing countries, but little is known about their effectiveness. Few have been rigorously evaluated, and none on a large-scale. This paper evaluates a large-scale handwashing campaign in three provinces of Vietnam in 2010. Exposure to the campaign resulted in a slight increase in the availability of handwashing materials in the household, and caregivers in the treatment group were more likely to report washing hands at some of the times emphasized by the campaign. However, observed handwashing with soap at these times is low, and there isn't any difference between the treatment and control groups. As a result, no impact on health or productivity is found. These results suggest that even under seemingly optimal conditions, where knowledge and access to soap and water are not main constraints, behavior change campaigns that take place on a large scale face tradeoffs in terms of intensity and effectiveness.

Behavior change --- Disease Control & Prevention --- Food & Beverage Industry --- Handwashing --- Health Monitoring & Evaluation --- Hygiene --- Hygiene Promotion and Social Marketing --- Macroeconomics and Economic Growth --- Population Policies --- Poverty Reduction --- Randomized evaluation --- Water Supply and Sanitation