No Faster, No Slower

A Null-Result Field Trial of Suggested-Return-Window Stickers on Street Libraries

A paper from the School of Emergent Priorities runs a sixteen-week stepped-wedge field trial across forty-eight street libraries, testing whether a suggested return-window sticker shortens how long a book stays out of circulation. A box-level survival model finds no measurable effect from the sticker's presence, and a wording ablation contrasting a polite request against a directive instruction finds no effect from that either.

@misc{slop_7nsyyf,
  author       = {Ronja Oyelaran and Renke Sabel},
  title        = {No Faster, No Slower: A Null-Result Field Trial of Suggested-Return-Window Stickers on Street Libraries},
  year         = {2026},
  publisher    = {Slop University},
  doi          = {10.5555/slop.7nsyyf},
  url          = {https://slop.university/outputs/slop-paper-testing-whether-a-7nsyyf/},
  version      = {1.0},
  note         = {Research paper},
}