Ask locals what they’d want from us—ask Rwandans and charity workers what they think the charity sector is missing or what problems they want help solving.
Experience sampling for happiness—do experience sampling (a much better way of assessing happiness than the usual “how satisfied are you with your life?” question) of people to get a better sense of how happy they are on a day-to-day basis.
Mental illness in developing world—talk to those who are dealing with mental illnesses (such as depression or anxiety) and learn more about how that might be similar or different in a developing world context.
Mental health professionals in the developing world—talk to a few mental health professionals about how mental health works in a developing world context and particular problems they’re facing.
Rural animal welfare—go to villages (ideally ones visited by GiveDirectly or other GiveWell top charities) and see what the quality of life of the animals there are.
Loss of child flow-through effects—ask those who have lost a child years in the past about their experience of it. I would research and talk to people about the best way to do this so as to cause as little distress as is possible given the topic. This would be to investigate the flow through effects of infant mortality on the family.
Vote here on topics
Ask locals what they’d want from us—ask Rwandans and charity workers what they think the charity sector is missing or what problems they want help solving.
Ask locals what EA is missing—tell Rwandans and charity workers about EA and ask them what they think that we are missing / what our blind spots are.
Factory farming—go to a factory farm and see what the conditions are like there compared to developed countries.
Experience sampling for happiness—do experience sampling (a much better way of assessing happiness than the usual “how satisfied are you with your life?” question) of people to get a better sense of how happy they are on a day-to-day basis.
Family planning—ask people from a diversity of places (urban, rural, middle class, poor, etc) about their preferred family size and how they think about it and contraceptives. Apparently there is some data that many Africans have smaller families than they’d like.Some people think the high fertility rate of Africa is a large contributor to its economic issues, so it could be a fruitful line of inquiry.
Mental illness in developing world—talk to those who are dealing with mental illnesses (such as depression or anxiety) and learn more about how that might be similar or different in a developing world context.
Mental health professionals in the developing world—talk to a few mental health professionals about how mental health works in a developing world context and particular problems they’re facing.
Rural animal welfare—go to villages (ideally ones visited by GiveDirectly or other GiveWell top charities) and see what the quality of life of the animals there are.
Wild animal suffering—follow around certain animals and bugs in the wild to make notes of what an average day in their life looks like.
Loss of child flow-through effects—ask those who have lost a child years in the past about their experience of it. I would research and talk to people about the best way to do this so as to cause as little distress as is possible given the topic. This would be to investigate the flow through effects of infant mortality on the family.