A Diminishing Returns Analysis: Analyses in Educational Contexts

Abstract Information: It may be intuitive that more engagement with treatments and interventions will result in better outcomes. But oftentimes there is a point at which improvement in outcomes tends to taper off in educational contexts, even when exposure to the instigating factor increases (Castaño-Muñoz, Sancho-Vinuesa, & Duart, 2013). For the current project, we conducted a “point of diminishing returns” analysis to identify breakpoints in program engagement data. Breakpoints, in the current context, are the point at which increased dosage of program activities begins to show diminishing returns in terms of favorable participant outcomes. Data emerge from a five-year evaluation of a legal education diversity pathway program, LexPreLaw. The evaluation employs a mixed-methods, quasi-experimental design that involves extensive monitoring of implementation and outcomes. We will spend 3 slides introducing the program design, 3 slides on the evaluation design and sample data, and 1 slide on prior research using diminishing returns analyses. We will use 5 slides to demonstrate practical application of the method using dichotomous and continuous variables as examples. We will spend 2 slides presenting results from our specific program context and 2 slides discussing what our findings mean for future iterations of the program. We will conclude with 4 slides that cover the general utility of this analysis in evaluation contexts.