2022).<sup>28</sup> Using face-to-face interviews, each respondent was asked to answer a set of questions on “how easy or difficult it is to” behave in a particular way relating to each of the scales. Responses were recorded using a five-point scale ranging from one (very difficult) to five (very easy). Details on the conscientiousness-related skill measures used are provided in Appendix D and Appendix Table D.1. While not perfect, the reliability metrics of the psychometric scales (Cronbach’s alpha and the interitem covariance, reported in Appendix Table D.2) are acceptable, and the reliability of the overall conscientiousness skill scale is satisfactory (Taber, 2018). Despite our efforts in carefully validating our measures for the local context, several factors might explain the imperfect scores of the scales: translation issues,<sup>29</sup> cultural differences, social desirability bias or the fact that we asked the questions in an interview format rather than have respondents self-report. These are in line with the concerns raised by Laajaj et al. (2019) that psychometric surveys, often designed with Western, educated, industrialized, rich and democratic (WEIRD) cultures in mind, may not be easily translatable to different contexts, especially in developing countries and for low-skilled workers.

With these caveats in mind, in Figure 2 we show the effect of the treatment on each of the measures of conscientiousness that we collected. While the effect of the intervention is statistically insignificant for most measures, in around 53 percent of cases the effect is positive. The training had a significantly positive impact on four of the 32 conscientiousness items and a significantly negative effect on only one measure. Specifically the four measures which were significantly higher due to the treatment are: how easy or difficult is it for you to (1) work towards reaching your goals; (2) focus on your most important goals; (3) live up to your responsibilities; and (4) fulfill your duties and obligations.<sup>30</sup> There are several possible explanations for why the effects on the measures of conscientiousness are so small. As mentioned above, these include issues related to the local context, but also could be due to high values for the baseline level of conscientiousness across all measures (ranging from 3.8 to 4.8 for the control group at baseline with an average of 4.4 across all traits) indicating very high response scores, saturated close to their maximum value of five. This might be because respondents feel pressured into making positive judgements about themselves to appear socially desirable or signal their willingness to keep their job at the construction company. Such high baseline scores leave little room for change/improvement in these measures as a result of the intervention.

> 28Given the fact that the end-line survey was conducted over the phone, concerns over the reliability of data on such measures when collected by phone survey and time constraints meant that the conscientiousness module was not included in the end-line.

> 29The measures we used were translated from English into French and then into the local language Wolof, which may affect reliability.

> 30It should be noted that we lose statistical significance when we adjust the _p_ -values using List et al.’s (2019) approach (see Appendix Tables D.3 and D.4).

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