The impact of providing information about the ECB's instruments on inflation expectations and trust in the ECB: Experimental evidence

We use a randomized controlled trial among Dutch households to analyze whether communication about ECB policy instruments impacts inflation expectations and trust in the ECB. All participants in the survey receive information about the ECB's goal, but only a subset also receives information about how the ECB tries to achieve this. Our results suggest that individuals who are informed about one of the ECB's policy instruments have inflation expectations closer to the ECB's inflation target than individuals who only receive information about the ECB's objective. Our results indicate that communication about ECB instruments does not impact trust in the ECB.