All Eyes on the Nerd? The Unequal Distribution of Teachers’ Attention

Author: Rigissa Megalokonomou (Monash University)Sofoklis Goulas (Yale University)Tommaso Sartori (Monash University)
Posted: 8 December 2025

Abstract

Teachers play a central role in shaping how students benefit from peers, yet little is known about how classroom composition affects their attention-allocation decisions. We conduct a large-scale randomized experiment using realistic classroom vignettes to assess how teachers engage with students under varying scenarios and objectives. The presence of a high achiever reduces the likelihood that teachers engage with a low achiever by about 8%, with substantially larger effects when teachers prioritize task success, consistent with convenience-based decision-making. Using administrative data, we show that low achievers perform worse when quasi-randomly assigned to a classroom with an exceptional student.
JEL codes: I21, I28, C93, D91, J24
Keywords: teacher behavior, attention allocation, randomized controlled trial, educational inequality, peer effects