# Does Free Pizza Cause Seminar Attendance?

Illustrative seminar. The data and discussion are authored examples.

## Slide 1 · 0:00 · Aniket Panjwani

Today I'm asking a simple question: does free pizza cause seminar attendance?

## Slide 1 · 0:05 · Aniket Panjwani

In our example data, attendance doubles when pizza is offered.

## Slide 1 · 0:09 · Professor George

Have you controlled for seminar quality? Some talks are considerably worse than the pizza.

## Slide 2 · 0:15 · Aniket Panjwani

An important concern. On the next slide, we randomly offer pizza at half the seminars.

## Slide 2 · 0:20 · Aniket Panjwani

Same room, same time, similarly impenetrable slides.

## Slide 2 · 0:24 · Laura

I signed the attendance sheet and left with three slices. Am I in your treatment group?

## Slide 3 · 0:30 · Aniket Panjwani

Unfortunately, yes. Which brings us to the final slide: what happens when the pizza runs out?

## Slide 3 · 0:36 · Aniket Panjwani

Attendance falls sharply. The remaining audience consists of the presenter, the organizer, and someone waiting for a recommendation letter.

## Slide 3 · 0:46 · Professor George

So your result is driven by the crust?

## Slide 3 · 0:48 · Aniket Panjwani

I'll address that in the robustness checks.