A Behavioral-Economic Perspective on Student Opinion Formation in General Secondary Education: A Comparative Analysis of Germany, the United States, and Ukraine

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Introduction

Developing students’ capacity for independent critical thinking and expressing their own views is not only a pedagogical taskbut it is also an economic challenge. In the modern knowledge economy, innovation and sound decision-making skills are highly valued. By contrast, conformity and limited independent thinking can lead to inefficient collective decisions and productivity losses. Education serves as a setting for shaping behavioral preferences and decision-making patterns. These patterns are repeated thousands of times in classrooms. Students choose to speak or remain silent.

They decide to take risks or avoid them. They either assume responsibility or shift it to others. Over time, such choices become stable behavioral strategies. Later, they affect career choices, entrepreneurial initiative, and civic participation. School years lay the foundations for future economic decisions. These include risk tolerance, perseverance, and the ability to defend one’s position. Recent studies show that education quality and student achievement shape both individual prospects and societal welfare.¹ Low outcomes in specific groups translate into productivity losses for the entire economy. Therefore, failure to foster critical thinking in schools has long-term labor-market and social consequences.

From a behavioral-economics perspective, the school environment can be viewed as choice architecture. Educators, deliberately or unintentionally, construct a decision space in which students act and form preferences. As Thaler and colleagues argue, influencing choices is unavoidable. Likewise, by setting classroom rules, grading systems, rewards, and punishments, teachers effectively serve as students’ choice architects.² As a result, different education systems produce different behavioral models. For example, the U.S. tends to promote more incentive-rich and openly discursive classroom cultures. Germany relies more on structured routines and formal procedures.

Ukraine reflects post-Soviet traditions that have historically emphasized hierarchy and compliance. This article shows how different architectures of educational incentives and sanctions shape students’ willingness to formulate and openly express their own positions. Specifically, it provides a comparative analysis of general secondary education in Germany, the U.S., and Ukraine. The analysis applies core concepts from behavioral economics. In addition, the review draws on broader international empirical evidence as background illustrations of behavioral mechanisms. To achieve this aim, the study addresses the following research questions:

1. How are educational environments and incentive systems in Germany, the U.S., and Ukraine linked to students’ willingness to voice their own positions?
2. How do behavioral-economics factors appear in classroom practices across these countries? Specifically, incentives and sanctions, fear of mistakes, social conformity, including preference falsification, and student agency.
3. Which differences in educational choice architecture explain variation in students’ willingness to voice their own positions? What policy implications follow, especially for Ukraine?

In this article, we use recent work in behavioral economics to critically analyze these questions. Specifically, we examine incentives and sanctions in learning, fear of mistakes as loss aversion, and social conformity. Here, conformity denotes the tendency to align one’s public behavior, opinions, or attitudes with majority norms, whereas preference falsification refers more specifically to publicly endorsing a position that diverges from one’s private belief to avoid social costs.^3,4 The author also distinguishes between student voice and student agency: student voice refers to students’ expression of views and participation in shaping classroom or school processes, whereas student agency denotes the broader proactive and transformative capacity to act intentionally on one’s learning environment; thus, voice is treated here as one visible manifestation of agency rather than a synonym for it.^5–7

Terminological Note

Student voice refers to students’ expression of views and participation in classroom or school processes. Student agency denotes the broader capacity to act intentionally, set goals, make choices, and influence one’s learning environment. Fehlerkultur is used here as an error-friendly classroom norm in which mistakes are treated as learning opportunities rather than as threats. Preference falsification refers to publicly endorsing a position that differs from one’s private belief to avoid social costs.

Materials and Methods

The study uses a comparative conceptual review design and an interpretive conceptual framework approach. It integrates perspectives from behavioral economics, educational psychology, and comparative education. The evidence base consists primarily of peer-reviewed publications, international analytical reports, and official education-policy documents. For claims about classroom discussion practices, formative assessment, student voice, and error climate, priority was given to peer-reviewed, country-specific studies; official policy documents were used primarily to describe governance arrangements, assessment frameworks, and reform architecture. To improve methodological transparency, the search strategy, search scope, screening procedure, selection counts, and source-composition summary are reported in Appendix A. The review combines empirical findings from the cited studies with conceptual comparative synthesis; accordingly, statements grounded directly in the literature are treated as empirical claims, whereas broader integrative propositions and causal linkages are presented as conceptual interpretations.

Source Selection Strategy

After final source updating, the analytical corpus consisted of 73 sources selected through a structured review procedure. Searches were conducted in major scholarly and policy-relevant databases and source platforms, including Scopus, Web of Science, ERIC, and Google Scholar, together with targeted searches of institutional repositories and policy platforms such as Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), Eurydice, the U.S. Department of Education, German Eurydice/KMK documentation, and selected Ukrainian education-reform sources. The main search and source-updating period covered January–April 2026, while the publication window prioritized sources published between 2020 and 2025, with three recent OECD policy sources added during final updating to strengthen the contemporaneity of the policy discussion.

Earlier foundational works were retained selectively where necessary for core theoretical concepts such as prospect theory, choice architecture, motivation crowding, preference falsification, and the distinction between student voice and student agency. The search strategy combined keywords related to the article’s conceptual focus and country scope, including combinations such as “choice architecture” AND education, “student voice” AND school, “fear of mistakes” AND classroom, “loss aversion” AND students, “preference falsification” AND education, “student agency” AND school, “formative assessment” AND school, “formative assessment” AND Ukraine, “classroom discussion” AND “United States,” and “error climate” AND Germany. Additional backward and forward citation tracking was used to identify directly relevant sources not captured in the initial search. A detailed account of the databases, search strings, date range, screening stages, and selection counts is provided in Appendix A.

Inclusion Criteria

Materials were screened using explicit inclusion and exclusion criteria. To be included, a source had to meet all of the following conditions: (1) substantive relevance to at least one of the study’s focal dimensions—choice architecture, incentives and sanctions, fear of mistakes/loss aversion, social conformity, including preference falsification, or student agency and student voice; (2) empirical, conceptual, or policy-analytical relevance to school education; (3) sufficient methodological or institutional transparency to support analytical use; (4) direct relevance to Germany, the U.S., or Ukraine, or clear comparative relevance for interpreting these cases; and (5) compatibility with the study’s behavioral-economic framing.

Exclusion Criteria

Sources were excluded if they were duplicative, journalistic, or purely opinion-based, methodologically opaque, or only marginally related to the article’s research questions. Screening was conducted by the author using the inclusion and exclusion criteria specified above. Because this is a single-author conceptual comparative review rather than a systematic review with independent coders, no inter-rater reliability coefficient was calculated. Ambiguous cases were resolved by prioritizing direct relevance to the article’s focal mechanisms, country scope, and evidential transparency.

Evidence quality was assessed indicatively rather than through a formal risk-of-bias tool. Peer-reviewed empirical studies, validation studies, meta-analyses, and official comparative reports were given greater evidential weight for claims about classroom mechanisms and measured outcomes. Official policy documents were used primarily to describe governance, assessment systems, and reform architecture. Older foundational works were retained only where they defined the core theoretical concepts, such as prospect theory, choice architecture, motivation crowding, and preference falsification. The screening process moved from initial identification to duplicate removal and preliminary relevance screening, then to title and abstract review, and finally to analytical inclusion.

Scope and Boundary Conditions of the Comparison

This comparison operates at the level of national institutional logics rather than as a claim of uniform classroom practice within each country. In the U.S., the federal role is limited, while states and districts retain substantial control over standards, assessment, curriculum, and funding; accordingly, the practical expression of student voice may vary across local accountability regimes, resource environments, and testing pressures.^8,9 Where teachers use stronger student-voice practices and are more receptive and responsive to students’ views, students report higher engagement and better academic outcomes, but the intensity of this pattern is not uniform across local contexts.^10,11

In Germany, the Länder govern schooling, and school-track differentiation means that classroom expectations, assessment practices, and error climate may differ across regions and school types.^12,13 Early selection into different educational tracks and the weight of formal assessment may intensify performance orientation in some contexts, even where error reflection and structured discussion are institutionally valued.^14,15 In Ukraine, a nationally regulated framework coexists with substantial urban–rural, regional, and wartime disparities, and so the implementation of competency-based, dialogic, and formative approaches remains uneven across schools.^16,17 Although the New Ukrainian School reform promotes student-­centered and formative practices, their classroom expression is moderated by local capacity, teacher preparation, resource inequality, and the continued salience of external assessment traditions.^18–20

Table 1 summarizes the principal within-country sources of variation that may moderate the relationship between educational choice architecture and student voice across the three cases. Taken together, the three cases should be interpreted not as internally uniform national models, but as institutionally patterned yet heterogeneous systems in which governance arrangements, school differentiation, assessment stakes, and territorial-resource disparities condition how educational choice architecture is translated into actual opportunities for student voice.

Table 1: Boundary conditions and within-country heterogeneity moderating the relationship between educational choice architecture and student voice in the U.S., Germany, and Ukraine.
Governance and Structural Configuration	Main Within-Country Heterogeneity	Moderating Implications for Educational Choice Architecture and Student Voice
The United States
Education is primarily governed at the state and local levels, while the federal role remains limited and mainly financial and analytical; states and districts retain substantial control over standards, curriculum, assessment, and funding.8	Marked variation exists across states, districts, and school communities in terms of funding, demographic composition, urban–rural location, and intergenerational educational inequality; resource distribution depends heavily on local and state budgets, and OECD data indicate a large gap in higher education attainment by parental education.8,21	Because local accountability regimes and school contexts vary substantially, the practical enactment of student voice is uneven. In more supportive classrooms, student voice is associated with stronger engagement and outcomes, whereas high-stakes accountability and test pressure may narrow curriculum and reduce open discussion.9–11,22
Germany
Schooling is governed mainly by the Länder, which shape legislation, standards, and school structures; the system is institutionally differentiated, including multiple secondary school tracks.12	Internal heterogeneity stems from Land-level differences, variation in school types and transition structures, and inequalities linked to socioeconomic background and migration status; PISA 2022 shows that socioeconomic status explains a comparatively large share of performance variation in Germany.12,23	Early tracking and formal assessment expectations moderate classroom culture and may intensify performance orientation in some contexts. Although error reflection and teacher support are institutionally visible, classroom error climate should not be treated as uniform across Länder, school types, or assessment settings.13,14,23,24
Ukraine
Educational policy is primarily regulated at the national level through legislation and the Ministry of Education and Science, although some administrative and financial responsibilities have been decentralized; the school structure is formally unified, and assessment follows national rules.16,17	The most visible disparities are urban–rural, regional, and war-related. Differences in infrastructure, school density, local capacity, and mixed funding conditions shape unequal educational environments; PISA 2022 for Ukrainian regions also indicates measurable socioeconomic effects on performance.15,16	The New Ukrainian School reform promotes competency-based learning, safer environments, and formative assessment, yet classroom implementation remains uneven. Teacher-led routines, summative assessment traditions, and external examination pressure continue to moderate the development of dialogic practices, constructive error culture, and student voice.17–20
Note: The table summarizes major within-country sources of heterogeneity that may moderate the relationship between educational choice architecture and student voice. It should be read as a comparative synthesis of institutional patterns rather than as an exhaustive description of all regional or school-level variation.

Methods of Analysis

The study applied the following four interconnected methods.

1. Content Analysis: First, the sources were organized around four behavioral-economics mechanisms underlying the article. These were (i) incentives and sanctions in education, (ii) loss aversion and fear of mistakes, (iii) social conformity, including preference falsification, and (iv) student agency, together with student voice practices. This approach structured diverse empirical and theoretical evidence within a single analytical framework.
2. Comparative Analysis: The main objects of comparison were the education systems of Germany, the U.S., and Ukraine. These were compared across error culture and attitudes to risk. The role of incentives and assessment was also examined. Further parameters included discussion practices and position expression. The autonomy levels, choice opportunities, and national education reforms were examined as well.
3. Conceptual Framework Construction and Heuristic Causal Mapping: Based on the synthesis, two interpretive visual outputs were developed. The first is a comparative conceptual framework summarizing the key behavioral drivers across the three countries. The second is a heuristic causal map linking classroom micropractices to downstream educational, behavioral, and economic outcomes. These representations are not formal models and do not test causal effects directly; rather, they synthesize convergent findings from behavioral-economics and comparative-education research into an interpretive explanatory scheme.
4. Use of Illustrative Materials: In addition to the three core countries, studies from other contexts are cited. These include selected additional contexts used as illustrative cases for specific agency and motivation mechanisms. These sources do not expand the comparative design. Instead, they provide additional empirical markers.

Distinction Between Empirical and Conceptual Claims

In the Results and Discussion section, claims are differentiated by evidential status. Statements describing the findings reported in the cited literature are treated as empirical claims. Cross-source generalizations, interpretive comparisons across national systems, and the proposed links from classroom practices to downstream economic outcomes are presented as conceptual synthesis rather than as directly tested causal effects. This distinction is maintained throughout the article and is reflected in the wording of the figures, tables, and concluding propositions.

Study Limitations

This study is neither experimental nor quantitative and does not claim direct causal identification. Its conclusions are based on a structured conceptual review, and comparative synthesis of published empirical and policy evidence. Accordingly, this article distinguishes between empirical findings reported in the source literature and the author’s conceptual integration of those findings into comparative frameworks and heuristic causal maps. Although the search and screening process was made explicit, the review is interpretive rather than systematic in the narrow meta-analytic sense. The contribution of the article, therefore, remains primarily conceptual and interpretive rather than empirically confirmatory.

Although the evidence base was strengthened through the inclusion of additional peer-reviewed, country-specific classroom studies and selected official policy sources, the final analytical corpus remains relatively limited for a three-country comparative review and should be read as selective rather than exhaustive. Accordingly, some claims—especially those linking classroom mechanisms across national contexts and those extending from educational processes to downstream human-capital, labor-market, and macroeconomic outcomes—would benefit from further triangulation through classroom observation, longitudinal designs, and small-scale pilot studies.

The manuscript should thus be read as a conceptually grounded comparative synthesis that identifies plausible mechanisms and testable pathways rather than as a definitive empirical validation of the full proposed model. In addition, the comparison captures dominant national institutional logics rather than uniform classroom practice, so the practical manifestation of student voice may vary within countries by region, district, or Land, school track, assessment pressure, and local resource conditions (U.S. Department of Education: Federal Role in Education;8 The Education System in the Federal Republic of Germany 2023/24;12 Ukraine: Administration and Governance at Central and/or Regional Level16).

Ethical Considerations

The study used only publicly available materials. No personal data was collected or processed, ensuring full compliance with research publication ethics.

Results and Discussion

Education as Choice Architecture

In behavioral economics, choice architecture refers to the deliberate design of environments in which choices are made. In other words, how options are presented and which incentives are embedded can strongly shape decisions, often unconsciously.²⁵ Schools and classrooms are student decision environments where teachers and policymakers act as choice architects by shaping rules, assessments, and discussion formats (e.g., hand-raising, response modes, question types, public vs. private grading, feedback, and error norms). Harsh penalties for mistakes can reduce risk-taking and silence students, while a try-and-learn climate encourages speaking up.

Growing evidence shows that even small changes in choice architecture can produce statistically significant behavioral shifts. A meta-analysis of 447 experiments found that the choice architecture interventions yield an average effect size of d = 0.43. This represents a small-to-moderate impact. The result is comparable to the effects of more costly traditional programs.26 Thoughtful educational choice architecture can be a low-cost tool (e.g., task wording, feedback, assessment), but it must respect autonomy. In schools, nudges should encourage activity and critical thinking without manipulating students’ views, supporting informed and conscious position-taking. Different countries have historically developed distinct architectures of educational environments. Figure 1 presents a comparative conceptual framework of three educational configurations.

Note: The figure summarizes dominant institutional tendencies rather than uniform classroom practice. In the U.S. panel, “Voice” refers to structured opportunities for students to express views and participate in classroom or school processes, while “Choice” refers to bounded options in learning or participation; “Agency with risk of overload” indicates that higher autonomy may strengthen initiative, but may also create choice overload without scaffolding. In the German panel, “Structure” refers to formalized instructional routines and clearer procedural expectations, “Mistake Culture” denotes an error-friendly classroom norm in which mistakes are treated as learning opportunities, and “Controlled Risk” refers to teacher-guided tolerance for error, managed uncertainty, and reasoned disagreement within formalized routines. In the Ukrainian panel, “Transition” denotes the ongoing reform shift from more teacher-centered and sanction-oriented routines toward competency-based and more dialogic practices; “Sanctions” refers to stronger punishment-oriented or mark-oriented regulation of behavior; “Fear of Mistakes/Conformity” denotes the tendency to avoid visible error and align publicly with expected answers; and “Reforms” refers to the ongoing shift associated with the New Ukrainian School.

In the U.S., schooling traditionally emphasizes soft skills, encouraging discussion, debate, and student self-expression.^10,11 Germany is more formalized: critical thinking is valued, but classroom interaction follows clearer procedures and structured norms.^13,27 In Ukraine, especially before recent reforms, a teacher-centered model inherited from the Soviet period limited student initiative.^28,29 These distinct educational designs shape how willing students are to speak up or challenge authority. At the same time, these national patterns should be read as institutional tendencies rather than uniform classroom realities, because their practical expression is moderated within countries by subnational governance, school-track differentiation, assessment stakes, and resource disparities.^8,12,16

Incentives and Sanctions in Education

Economic incentive theory assumes that people respond to rewards and punishments by adjusting their behavior. In schools, incentives operate through grades, praise, and rewards. Sanctions operate through reprimands, punishments, or negative marks. Classical economic logic suggests that a well-designed incentive system should improve learning outcomes. However, empirical results of such interventions are mixed. A large field experiment in British schools found that financial or material rewards for achievement had little or no average effect.¹

Other studies show that repeated attempts to nudge students or teachers with money rarely produced lasting results. Programs introduced teacher bonuses for student performance. Some schemes paid students for attendance or grades. Yet overall effects remained modest.^30,31 This led scholars to question why traditional incentives often fail. One reason is motivation crowding-out: external rewards can displace intrinsic interest, so students trained to work mainly for grades or prizes may later lose genuine curiosity. This interpretation is supported by self-determination theory and the broader concept of the crowding-out effect.^31,32

On the other hand, positive incentives can still work under specific conditions. First, incentive design matters greatly. Loss-framed incentives may be more effective than gain-framed bonuses in some settings: when a reward is provided in advance and withdrawn if goals are not met, effort may increase.^1,7 However, such incentives are not universally beneficial, because excessive external pressure may crowd out intrinsic motivation or induce strategic, counterproductive behavior.^32–34 Second, non-material incentives can be as powerful as money. Public praise, recognition, or privileges often motivate students effectively. In the English experiment, students rewarded with a trip performed similar to those receiving cash. This suggests that social and emotional incentives can be strong drivers.

Sanctions and punishments have a dual effect. Moderate negative consequences for poor behavior can improve discipline. Examples include warnings or extra assignments. However, excessive punishment creates fear and stress. This undermines learning motivation and student initiative. Students afraid of severe penalties tend to avoid risky situations. They refrain from asking questions or challenging ideas, even when they disagree. As shown later, fear of mistakes closely relates to loss aversion and reduced student activity. Overall, researchers agree that educational incentives require careful behavioral design. Positive reinforcement is often more effective than punishment, but even incentive-based designs work best when they support intrinsic motivation rather than displace it.

Fear of Mistakes and Loss Aversion

Fear of mistakes is a common psychological phenomenon in education. In practice, this is one of the clearest mechanisms through which sanctions and high-stakes evaluation shape student behavior. Students worry about giving wrong answers or making errors due to possible negative consequences. In behavioral economics, this fear reflects loss aversion. Prospect theory states that people experience losses more intensely than equivalent gains.³⁵ In school settings, a loss may mean a lower grade, damaged reputation, or a sense of failure.

Empirical evidence confirms that loss aversion shapes student behavior during assessment. Karle and colleagues studied multiple-choice testing with penalties for wrong answers.³⁶ Students with stronger loss aversion left more questions unanswered. As a result, they achieved lower overall scores. Fear of losing points discouraged them from taking chances. This effect is especially strong when blank answers are not penalized. In such cases, highly loss-averse students choose not to respond. They avoid guaranteed losses but miss potential gains. An interesting side finding concerns gender differences. The same study partly explains why female students skip answers more often. On average, they displayed slightly higher loss aversion than male students.36 Social expectations and self-confidence may contribute to this pattern.

Fear of mistakes undermines opinion formation in several ways. First, students avoid answering open questions or joining discussions. They hesitate when unsure that their view is correct. In systems with strict penalties or ridicule for errors, a culture of silence emerges. Remaining silent feels safer than risking a mistake. Second, fear of mistakes reduces creativity and inquiry. Students prefer routine solutions and repeat expected answers. They avoid proposing original ideas that might be wrong. Without tolerance for errors, innovation in thinking cannot develop.

Moderate evaluative pressure can sometimes increase effort, but only up to the point at which fear begins to suppress participation and inquiry. In educational settings, the key issue is therefore not whether error has a cost, but whether that cost remains pedagogically manageable.^37,38 Yet it is crucial not to cross the line where fear becomes a barrier. Teachers’ support and a constructive view of errors can reduce destructive anxiety. Modern approaches agree that mistakes should be part of learning. Students must have the right to err without severe consequences. In return, they should receive constructive feedback.

Germany illustrates how an error-friendly culture (Fehlerkultur) can improve outcomes. In educational research, a functional error climate refers to the perception, evaluation, and use of errors as integral elements of classroom learning; in this article, Fehlerkultur is used in that sense, namely, as a classroom norm in which mistakes are treated as learning opportunities rather than as threats.¹³ However, this pattern should not be treated as homogeneous across the German system, because classroom error climate is also shaped by Länder-level governance, school-track differentiation, and differences in assessment settings.^13,14 Teachers’ encourage analysis and reflection instead of punishment, and peers are taught to be supportive. Empirical evidence shows that such positive error climates reduce fear of failure, strengthen intrinsic motivation, and predict more constructive responses and higher performance over time.³⁹

In the international context, attitudes toward mistakes differ across systems. In the U.S., classroom-level evidence presents a more differentiated picture than a single national “fail-safe” label would suggest: teacher responsiveness to student voice is associated with stronger engagement and academic outcomes, while studies of how teachers respond to student mistakes indicate that error handling is context-dependent rather than uniformly error-friendly.^10,11,40 More recent classroom-level observational work further shows that mistake responses are patterned rather than uniform: five recurrent response patterns were linked to emotional safety, agency, and opportunities to engage with errors.⁴¹ In Germany, Fehlerkultur and learning through error analysis remain key reference points.³⁹

Country-specific classroom studies further show that a positive perceived error climate predicts more adaptive reactions to errors and lower alienation from teachers, while German formative-assessment interventions interact with instructional quality in shaping students’ achievement and interest.^13,24,42 In Ukraine, the system is gradually shifting from punitive logic to formative assessment, although this transition remains uneven across urban and rural schools, regions, and wartime-affected contexts.^19,27 However, the inertia of fear of mistakes is still noticeable.⁴³ In classrooms, peers shape behavior alongside teachers. Conformity arises from both explicit norms (rules, teachers’ expectations) and informal peer norms (what is “cool,” reactions to high achievers). The desire to fit in can suppress student voice, especially when one’s view differs from the majority.

The term preference falsification, introduced by Kuran, refers to publicly endorsing a view that differs from one’s private belief in order to avoid social costs or social disapproval.⁴ In this article, it denotes a specific mechanism within broader social conformity: students may outwardly align with dominant classroom norms while privately holding a different position. The concept originated in political contexts, where citizens may privately disagree with a regime but publicly comply until a tipping point. The same mechanism appears in classrooms: students may privately disagree yet stay silent out of fear of social disapproval, creating false unanimity.

Schools can reduce false unanimity by normalizing controversy and teaching discussion as a procedure. In Germany, the Beutelsbach Consensus (1976) requires presenting controversial issues as controversial and prohibits imposing a single “correct” view on students, which institutionalizes reasoned disagreement in civic education.²⁷ Recent German classroom-level research also links open classroom climate to students’ willingness to participate and shows that teacher–student relationships and warm calling can facilitate oral participation.^44,45

Researchers model conformity as a strategic game with competing payoffs. On one side, students gain from expressing their own views. They may feel authentic or gain long-term benefits from critical thinking. On the other side, they gain reputational benefits from conforming. These include approval from the majority. Duffy and Lafky show that when rewards for conformity are high, behavior can stay unchanged. This persistence can remain even after most individuals privately shift their views.⁴⁶ Once the payoff of independence outweighs the fear of social sanctions, the norms can switch abruptly. This resembles cascade-like protests in society. In classrooms, one brave student may voice dissent openly. Others who also disagreed may then follow. Without such a leader, conformity is likely to persist.

The Ukrainian school context illustrates how institutional authority and a culture of “one correct answer” can reinforce conformity and silence student voice. Historically, success in Ukrainian secondary schools has been measured by reproducing approved answers. The tradition inherited from the Soviet system emphasized mastering a single canon of knowledge. It offered little space for debating with teachers.²⁹ Until recently, classrooms were dominated by closed questions with predetermined answers. Students’ own reasoning often remained secondary. According to students’ testimonies, expressing an alternative view could be seen as a challenge to teacher authority. Disagreement sometimes affected grades and teacher attitudes. As a result, students learned that silence or agreement was safer than risking an error.

Comparative studies describe Ukrainian education culture as largely authoritarian and conformist. Even in the early twenty-first century, it prioritized discipline and unanimity over critical thinking and debate.^28,29 In interviews, Ukrainian teachers admit that critical thinking was not a priority in the past. This was especially true in humanities subjects. Students were expected to reproduce textbook positions rather than question them. In recent years, Ukraine launched the New Ukrainian School reform. The reform declared a shift toward competency-based education and critical thinking.

Yet changes in everyday practice remain gradual.^43,47 Most current studies report insufficient development of critical thinking among school graduates. Experimental assessments of younger students reveal low levels of analysis and argumentation skills.⁴⁷ These findings confirm a long-standing focus on single correct answer instead of critical discussion. At the same time, the persistence of these patterns is not uniform across the country, because reform uptake is mediated by local school capacity, teacher training, regional conditions, and the widening contrast between better-resourced urban settings and more constrained rural or war-affected contexts.^18,20

Conformity takes different forms across the three systems. The U.S. schools are more individualistic and often counter peer pressure through anti-bullying policies, though adolescent conformity persists. Germany tends toward stronger procedural (disciplinary) conformity, which supports order but can limit spontaneous expression. Ukraine has historically emphasized respect for authority, reinforcing unquestioned conformity; despite democratic and European-integration shifts toward open discourse, inertia remains. Overall, conformity and preference falsification still hinder student voice, so classrooms need normalized pluralism, non-punitive dissent, and norms that support critical discussion.

Student Voice as a Behavioral Asset: Agency, Mechanisms, and Empirical Validation

Student agency denotes the broader capacity to act intentionally, make choices, and influence one’s learning environment through proactive and transformative participation in classroom activity.⁴⁸ In this article, student voice is treated as one visible expression of agency rather than as a synonym for it: voice refers specifically to the articulation of views and participation in classroom or school processes.^5,6 Student agency, by contrast, includes but is not limited to voice, because it also encompasses goal-setting, self-direction, initiative, and the capacity to shape one’s learning trajectory. Competency-based education, promoted in many countries including Ukraine, seeks to transform passive learners into active subjects.

From a behavioral-science perspective, agency is closely linked to motivation and long-term outcomes. Studies show that when students have choices in learning, engagement increases. Responsibility for projects and goal setting also improves results. Agentic students display higher motivation, persistence, and self-confidence. These traits support academic achievement and emotional well-being. Evidence from Finland illustrates this link. Introducing self-directed learning elements helped students plan work and assess progress. Over time, this improved self-regulation skills and academic performance.⁴⁹ Supporting agency can therefore be viewed as an investment in human-capital. Graduates who learn autonomy are more likely to become proactive workers, entrepreneurs, and innovators. This ultimately contributes to broader economic development.

Agency is supported through different institutional mechanisms across educational cultures. These include safe attitudes to mistakes, structured autonomy, and opportunities for student participation. In Germany, a culture of reasoned disagreement combines with tolerance for errors. This fosters readiness for managed intellectual risk among students. They express unconventional ideas more freely and question proposed claims without fear. Such an environment builds skills for evaluating risks and learning from mistakes.³⁹

In the U.S., the key mechanism of agency is student voice. Students are granted the right to express their positions and influence learning processes. From early grades, children are encouraged to share opinions and ask questions. Since the early 2000s, a movement has grown to expand student influence on educational decisions.⁵⁰ Teachers create settings where even younger pupils can express views and provide feedback. These include class discussions, project work, and student surveys. Related U.S. research on open classroom climate reports similar associations with political engagement, civic knowledge, and critical consciousness among adolescents.^51,52 Empirical studies confirm the benefits of this approach. Schools that genuinely hear student opinions show higher motivation and achievement.¹¹

Student participation strengthens subjectivity and academic independence. Even one teacher who regularly seeks feedback is linked to better grades and attendance. It also raises students’ sense of responsibility. Long-term observations indicate that cultivating student voice develops leadership, communication, and self-reflection skills.⁵⁰ Overall, peer-reviewed research in the U.S. consistently demonstrates clear effects. Yet these effects are best interpreted as context-sensitive rather than nationally uniform, because district governance, accountability pressures, and local school cultures shape how consistently student voice is enacted in practice.^9,10 Where students are taught to speak openly, they engage more actively and feel more confident in learning environments.

A second agency mechanism in the American model is autonomy through task choice. A meta-analysis of 41 studies showed that offering choice increases intrinsic motivation and achievement.⁵³ However, autonomy requires clear limits. Too many options can create choice overload, reducing satisfaction and willingness to decide.⁵⁴ Thus, the American model promotes high activity and initiative. Yet it also needs pedagogical guidance. Teachers must limit options and provide structure to avoid overload and maintain focus. Recent research supports this bounded-choice logic: autonomy and structure are not opposites, and student motivation is strongest when meaningful choice is combined with clear expectations, scaffolding, and teacher guidance rather than with unlimited options.^55,56 Quantitative evidence and teacher opinions suggest that American graduates are generally confident and expressive. They interact easily and defend their views. At the same time, they may show lower tolerance for ambiguity and struggle with excessive alternatives.

Not all approaches are equally effective in developing agency. Romanticizing “free learning” has also faced criticism. Experience shows that granting full freedom without support can backfire. Ponomariovienė and Jakavonytė-Staškuvienė found that young students can display mature agency. They can set meaningful goals and reflect on progress. Yet this happens only in safe environments with constructive feedback and clear boundaries.⁵⁷ Without guidance, children set vague or unrealistic goals. They may misjudge their performance or misuse freedom for distractions such as gaming. The agency, therefore, requires development and support. Researchers describe it as a cultivated capacity. It depends on deliberate teaching strategies and a reflective school culture. In this system, the teacher acts as a facilitator. Instead of dictating, the teacher guides through questions, feedback, and adjustment of plans.

Scholarly debates on student agency echo the older dispute between traditional and progressive education. Advocates of conservative approaches caution against excessive autonomy for children. They emphasize immaturity and the need for firm guidance. Behavioral economists typically value autonomy but stress the role of soft prompts and choice architecture. The optimal model lets students feel like authors of their decisions. Yet the environment must be structured so decisions remain productive. This libertarian paternalist approach, associated with Thaler and Sunstein, fits learning-through-engagement well.² Students choose, but each option still leads to meaningful learning. For example, students select one project topic from several useful topics.

The Ukrainian case also shows how punitive assessment can suppress agency by turning mistakes into social threats and encouraging failure avoidance rather than initiative. Positive shifts began with the New Ukrainian School reform, which promoted greater tolerance for mistakes and formative assessment, but implementation remains uneven, and many classrooms still reflect older routines in practice. For this reason, the Ukrainian transition should be understood not as a complete replacement of earlier norms, but as an ongoing and uneven shift toward a more supportive error climate.⁴³

From an international perspective, agency is especially salient for Ukraine during ongoing reforms. In the U.S., independence has long been culturally embedded. Children learn early that speaking up matters. In Germany, traditions of self-directed learning extend back to Humboldtian ideals. By contrast, Ukrainian schooling long emphasized top-down knowledge transmission. The New Ukrainian School reform highlights entrepreneurship, initiative, and critical thinking.

These are core dimensions of agency. Implementation, however, faces staffing, methodological, and territorial challenges, and its effects remain uneven across regions, school communities, and wartime educational conditions.^16,18 Many teachers struggle to shift from controllers to mentors. Still, progress is visible. OECD survey data show that many Ukrainian adolescents feel creative across subjects. PISA 2022 reports that 86% feel confident expressing ideas at school.⁵⁸ This exceeds the OECD average. It suggests that younger cohorts are gradually becoming more willing to express their views at school. Yet the agency develops unevenly. Outcomes often combine discipline with low initiative under uncertainty.

A key boundary condition is that the framework does not predict that structure or conformity automatically suppresses educational success. Germany shows that structured routines can coexist with reasoned disagreement and a constructive error climate. East-Asian high-performing systems provide a broader counterexample: recent OECD evidence shows that some structured systems combine high achievement with strong creative-thinking outcomes.^59,60 Therefore, the framework predicts weaker student voice mainly where structure is combined with punitive error climate, limited opportunities for reasoned participation, and weak support for agency under uncertainty. It does not predict that all structured or culturally cohesive systems necessarily reduce creativity, achievement, or civic participation.^61,62

These features shape a specific behavioral profile among Ukrainian graduates. Many acquire adaptive conformity. They learn to align with authority expectations. In class, this appears as discipline and respect for the teacher’s instructions. Students may avoid open disagreement and choose silence. Such adaptability can support social stability. Yet it can also suppress initiative and creativity. Comparative education studies note that obedience-oriented systems reduce innovative thinking.^28,29 In Ukraine, this may reduce youth participation in public debate and volunteering. Young people may hesitate to propose initiatives and wait for directives.

Economic initiative can also remain constrained. Many young Ukrainians express strong entrepreneurial aspirations. Yet they report limited skills and confidence to act.⁶³ Surveys show that many prefer stable employment over entrepreneurship. One reason is low tolerance for risk and weak creative problem-solving. Institutional analyses confirm perceived barriers. Youth cite limited support from education and the state.⁶⁴ In short, graduates may have strong theoretical knowledge. Yet they can be less prepared for uncertainty, requiring independent decisions and error tolerance.

Current reforms aim to shift this pattern. Courses on entrepreneurship and financial literacy support initiative. Active learning methods and project work foster risk-management skills. Early evidence from the New Ukrainian School is promising. Students in experimental classes show greater readiness to argue their views and take responsibility.⁴⁷ Despite historically rooted conformity, Ukrainian schooling is moving toward a more agentic graduate profile. For now, the dominant pattern remains transitional. Many students are adaptively conformist and system-oriented. They are not always sufficiently proactive or entrepreneurial under uncertainty.

Student economic agency is both a key educational goal and a driver of learning effectiveness. It requires balance: freedom supported by behavioral anchors such as clear goals, feedback, and norms. In our three-country comparison, we examine how different choice architectures enable agency and shape students’ willingness to form and voice opinions, treating debate and error either as resources or as risks. Table 2 summarizes the key mechanisms and anchors them in country-specific evidence on discussion practices, error climate, and choice structures across the three educational contexts.

Table 2: Embedded mechanisms shaping student voice across three educational cultures.
Mechanism	Germany	The United States	Ukraine
Controversy/discussion	A norm in civic and political education; structured discussion is institutionally valued. 27,44,45	Student voice practices and responsiveness to student feedback are associated with stronger engagement and academic outcomes, but their enactment varies across schools and districts. 11,50–52	Authority inertia with gradual reform toward discussion-based and competency-oriented learning.28,29,43,47
Error climate	Fehlerkultur as an error-friendly classroom norm → constructive responses to errors; classroom error climate varies across school types and settings.13,14,39	Teacher responses to student mistakes are context-dependent rather than uniformly error-tolerant; supportive mistake handling can build trust and inquiry, but error treatment varies across classrooms.40,41,65	Fear of mistakes with an uneven shift toward formative assessment under the New Ukrainian School reform.18–20,43
Choice/autonomy	Structured autonomy within formalized instructional routines.14,39	Choice can strengthen motivation and engagement, but excessive choice may create overload without a pedagogical structure.53,54	Entrepreneurship and initiative are reform priorities, but their classroom realization remains uneven and constrained by local capacity.57,63,64

These cross-country differences translate into several practical policy implications for Ukraine. First, reduce the cost of mistakes through formative assessment and a “right to draft” to lower loss aversion. Second, normalize classroom controversy via structured discussion and safe-speech rules to reduce preference falsification and silent conformity. Third, replace sanction-based incentives with social and learning-oriented reinforcement that protects intrinsic motivation. Fourth, build student agency through limited, guided choice (“choice with boundaries”) to avoid overload while preserving ownership. These recommendations can be translated into concrete classroom routines.

Formative assessment may be implemented through a right-to-draft cycle, short error-analysis logs, two-stage answering, and revision-oriented feedback scripts such as “This is a useful first attempt; now strengthen it by adding evidence, clarifying the claim, or considering a counterargument.” Structured academic controversy may be organized through short teacher-moderated protocols with assigned positions, turn-taking rules, and an explicit no-ridicule norm, followed by brief reflection on whether students’ public and private views changed.

Guided choice may be operationalized through two to four meaningful task options with clear criteria, shared rubrics, and brief teacher scaffolding rather than unlimited freedom. Such nudges should remain autonomy-preserving and transparent: they should structure participation and reflection without steering students toward predetermined substantive views. If future pilot studies assess student voice or agency, data collection should be limited to minimal, non-sensitive, and preferably de-identified or aggregated information, with clear notice to participants and no use of such data for punitive individual evaluation.

Implementation should not be treated as one-size-fits-all. These routines require teacher preparation, classroom time, and some reduction of purely summative pressure. In under-resourced, rural, or war-­affected schools, the most feasible starting points are low-cost routines: one right-to-draft task per unit, short error-analysis journals, two-stars-and-a-wish peer feedback, and brief turn-taking discussion protocols. These can usually be implemented with paper, a board, or standard notebooks and can be integrated into regular assignment cycles.

Equity also matters. Risk tolerance and student voice may differ by gender, socioeconomic position, language background, and previous exposure to supportive or punitive classroom climates. Therefore, voice-supportive design should include private-to-public response formats, anonymous first responses, structured turn-taking, language scaffolds where relevant, revision opportunities before public evaluation, and teacher monitoring of participation patterns. Without such safeguards, dialogic and choice-based reforms may amplify the voices of already confident or socially secure students rather than broaden participation. Taken together, Table 2 suggests that the three systems differ not only in broad institutional logics, but also in how discussion norms, mistake handling, and autonomy are enacted at classroom level.

Together, these steps may help move Ukrainian schooling from adaptive conformity toward productive subjectivity. Their expected contribution to human capital and economic resilience should be treated as a plausible long-term pathway rather than as a directly demonstrated causal effect. Figure 2 presents a heuristic causal map of the proposed pathway from educational choice architecture to macroeconomic effects. To make this conceptual pathway more empirically tractable, Table 3 operationalizes student voice as a behavioral asset, proposes measurable indicators for its classroom-level manifestations, and distinguishes between links in Figure 2 that are more directly supported by existing evidence and those that remain more indirect or conceptually inferred.^10,66,67

Table 3: Operationalization of student voice as a behavioral asset and empirical status.
Construct/Figure 2 level	Indicative Measurable Indicators	Possible Instruments/­Operational Procedures	Evidential Status in the Present Model
Student voice as a behavioral asset	Frequency of voluntary contributions; perceived opportunities to speak; participation in classroom and school decisions; adult responsiveness to student input; perceived influence.	Student Voice Practices scales (school- and classroom-level); Student Participation Scale; teacher logs of student consultation; counts of voluntary contributions per lesson.10,66	Directly measurable
Student agency	Agentic engagement; self-initiated questions and suggestions; goal-setting; revision uptake; self-directed task management.	Agentic Engagement Scale/agentic engagement items; student self-report plus teacher ratings; task-completion logs.48	Directly measurable
Discussion participation and safety	Willingness to participate in discussion; perceived discussion safety; classroom opinion climate; distribution of talk turns; teacher communion/agency.	Pre/post student survey on willingness to participate; observation of turn-taking; discussion-safety items; classroom opinion-climate measures.67,68	Directly measurable
Error climate/fear of mistakes	Perceived constructive response to mistakes; willingness to answer when unsure; omission/non-response under evaluative pressure; perceived punitive pressure.	Classroom error-climate scales; student survey items; teacher feedback logs; low-stakes vs. penalty-task comparison.13,67	Directly measurable
Tolerance of ambiguity/uncertainty	Comfort with open-ended tasks; readiness to answer without certainty; tolerance of ambiguity/uncertainty index; persistence under indeterminate conditions.	Short ambiguity/uncertainty scale adapted for adolescents; OECD tolerance-of-ambiguity construct as conceptual anchor; scenario-based classroom tasks.69	Measurable but requires adaptation
Behavioral and learning outcomes	Engagement; self-regulation; attendance; grades; discussion participation; revision behavior.	Pre/post engagement and classroom-climate measures; school records; structured observations.10,55	More directly supported
Human-capital and labor-market behavior	Initiative; entrepreneurial intention; civic efficacy; problem-solving under uncertainty.	Delayed follow-up survey; project-based performance tasks; self-report intention measures.	Indirect/longitudinal
Macroeconomic outcomes	Productivity; institutional quality; resilience to crises and change.	Not directly testable in a school pilot; requires macrolevel and longitudinal linkage.	Conceptual/speculative
Note: The instruments listed in Table 3 are illustrative options for future empirical testing rather than measures applied in the present study. Their use in a school-based pilot would require age-appropriate adaptation, translation/back-translation where necessary, and reliability testing in the target sample. Previously validated measures are available for student voice practices, agentic engagement, academic school climate, discussion safety, and classroom error climate; however, some indicators, especially tolerance of ambiguity and uncertainty, would require additional adaptation for adolescent classroom contexts. Illustrative exemplar items and response formats for the constructs listed in Table 3 are provided in Appendix B.

Note: The figure is an interpretive conceptual map, not a statistical model. The upper part of the pathway, from educational choice architecture to classroom mechanisms and proximal behavioral outcomes, is more directly supported by the reviewed classroom-level literature. The lower part, from behavioral and learning outcomes to human capital, labor-market behavior, and macroeconomic outcomes, remains inferential and hypothesis-generating. The arrows indicate proposed directions for future testing rather than estimated causal effects.

The boxes represent sequential conceptual levels: educational system design, classroom-level behavioral mechanisms, proximal behavioral and learning outcomes, downstream human-capital and labor-market dispositions, and broader economic outcomes. The arrows in Figure 2 indicate hypothesized directional links synthesized from the reviewed literature; they do not represent estimated coefficients or directly tested causal effects. The figure is intended as an interpretive conceptual map rather than as a statistical model.

In this article, student voice as a behavioral asset is understood not as a single attitude, but as a measurable cluster of classroom-level dispositions and practices that can accumulate over time. At a minimum, this cluster includes opportunities to speak, actual participation, adult responsiveness to student input, willingness to participate under uncertainty, and the extent to which participation is converted into purposeful action and self-directed learning. Accordingly, the concept can be operationalized through a combination of validated student voice, participation, engagement, and classroom-climate measures rather than through a single proxy indicator.^10,66,67 The evidential status of the proposed conceptual pathway is summarized in Box 1.

Box 1: Evidential status of the conceptual pathway.

The model distinguishes three levels of evidential status. First, classroom-level mechanisms such as error climate, discussion safety, student voice practices, and autonomy-supportive structure are treated as empirically grounded because they are supported by peer-reviewed classroom studies and validation research. Second, cross-country comparisons are treated as conceptual synthesis because they integrate empirical and policy evidence across different institutional settings. Third, links from classroom mechanisms to human-capital, labor-market behavior, and macroeconomic outcomes are treated as inferential and hypothesis-generating. These downstream links require longitudinal, quasi-experimental, or mixed-methods testing before causal claims can be made.

The instruments listed in Table 3 are presented as illustrative options for future empirical testing rather than as measures applied in the present study. The upper part of Figure 2—from educational choice architecture to classroom mechanisms and then to behavioral and learning outcomes—is the most directly supported by available empirical evidence. Existing studies support links between student voice practices and engagement or achievement, between safe classroom discussion and willingness to participate, between constructive error climate and adaptive responses to mistakes, and between autonomy-supportive structure and student motivation.^{10,11,21,55,56,68}

By contrast, the lower part of the chain—from behavioral and learning outcomes to human-capital, labor-market behavior, and macroeconomic outcomes—should be read as a more indirect and mediated pathway rather than as a directly established causal sequence. These downstream links are likely shaped by multiple confounding and alternative pathways, including family resources, school segregation, tracking, labor-market institutions, governance quality, and wider innovation systems. The implications for empirical testing are summarized in Box 2.

Box 2: Implications for empirical testing.

This conceptual model can be translated into small-scale, testable hypotheses.

H1: Classes implementing a formative-assessment nudge package (e.g., a right-to-draft routine, error-analysis logs, and revision-oriented feedback) will show higher perceived error climate, stronger willingness to answer when uncertain, and higher agentic engagement at post-test than comparison classes.13,70

H2: Classes implementing a safe-discussion protocol (e.g., structured academic controversy or scaffolded controversial-issue discussion with explicit no-ridicule norms and turn-taking rules) will show higher willingness to participate, a more balanced distribution of talk turns, and higher student voice scores than comparison classes.63

H3: A bounded-choice intervention offering two to four meaningful task options with clear criteria and teacher guidance will increase student agency and task engagement more than either unlimited-choice or no-choice conditions.55,56

A feasible pilot design would include several comparable classes over a six- to eight-week period, using pre/post student surveys, classroom observation, teacher logs, and routine school indicators such as attendance, revision uptake, and grades. Because students are nested within classes, future testing should use cluster-aware analysis. A practical pilot could include approximately 6–8 classes with 20–25 students per class, yielding an estimated sample of 120–200 students. Such a sample would be suitable for feasibility testing and detecting medium-sized classroom-level effects, while larger samples would be needed for smaller effects and subgroup analysis. A worked classroom vignette showing how the proposed mechanisms can be operationalized in practice is provided in Box 3.

Box 3: Worked classroom vignette: right-to-draft, error log, and turn-taking protocol.

A teacher introduces a short argumentative writing task on a civic or social topic. Students first write a draft response individually. The teacher explains that the first version will not receive a final mark. Instead, students will use it to identify one claim, one piece of evidence, and one uncertainty. This creates a “right-to-draft” routine and lowers the immediate cost of making a mistake.

In the next step, students complete a brief error log. They identify one unclear sentence, one weak argument, or one missing example. The teacher models revision-oriented feedback: “This is a useful first attempt; now strengthen it by adding evidence or considering a counterargument.” Mistakes are therefore treated as material for improvement rather than as evidence of failure.

The class then moves to a short turn-taking discussion. Students first share ideas in pairs, then one idea from each pair is brought to the whole class. The teacher uses a no-ridicule rule and requires students to respond to ideas rather than to classmates personally. Students may revise their initial view after hearing others.

The final product is a revised paragraph. The mark is based not only on correctness, but also on revision effort, use of evidence, and respectful engagement with alternative views. This routine operationalizes the article’s mechanisms in one sequence: formative assessment reduces loss aversion, the error log supports constructive error climate, turn-taking lowers participation costs, and bounded discussion strengthens student voice without removing teacher structure.

This classroom-level operationalization is also consistent with recent OECD policy work that emphasizes engaged and resilient learners, civic and social engagement, and the transformation of Ukraine’s upper secondary education through clearer learning pathways, skills development, and implementation support.^71–73 These classroom-level implications are summarized in Table 4 as low-cost policy levers for strengthening student voice through choice architecture.

Table 4: Policy levers for strengthening student voice through low-cost classroom choice architecture.
Mechanism	The United States	Germany	Ukraine
Incentives and sanctions	Maintain recognition-based incentives while avoiding excessive performance pressure.	Use feedback routines that connect formal assessment with revision.	Replace punitive marking routines with revision-oriented feedback; high feasibility.
Fear of mistakes/loss aversion	Expand low-stakes answering and draft-before-grade routines.	Strengthen Fehlerkultur through explicit error-analysis tasks.	Introduce right-to-draft, two-stage answering, and short error logs; high feasibility.
Conformity/preference falsification	Use anonymous first responses and structured discussion to reduce peer pressure.	Use controversial-issue protocols within formal classroom routines.	Use no-ridicule norms, private-to-public answers, and turn-taking rules; high feasibility.
Student agency/bounded choice	Keep choices meaningful but limited to avoid overload.	Combine autonomy with clear procedures and teacher scaffolding.	Offer 2–4 task options with rubrics and teacher guidance; medium feasibility.
Equity and implementation	Monitor participation across student groups.	Adapt routines across tracks and Länder contexts.	Prioritize low-cost routines for rural, under-resourced, and war-affected schools; urgent feasibility tier.
Note: The table translates the conceptual framework into practical levers. The Ukraine-focused feasibility tiers reflect the need to prioritize low-cost routines that can be implemented under large class sizes, teacher workload, assessment pressure, and wartime disruption.

Conclusions

A behavioral-economic lens clarifies the mechanisms behind student opinion formation in diverse educational settings. Incentives and sanctions, fear of mistakes, conformity, and agency jointly influence independent thinking. These factors can either support or hinder genuine intellectual autonomy. Comparative analysis of Germany, the U.S., and Ukraine reveals distinct educational choice architectures. These architectures shape student behavioral attitudes in different ways. At the same time, these relationships are not linear or universal: the effects of incentives, autonomy, and conformity depend on whether structure is combined with punitive pressure or with supportive guidance, bounded choice, and culturally mediated opportunities for participation.

For Ukraine, which seeks integration into the global educational space, these insights are crucial. It is important to reduce excessive fear of failure. Constructive discussion should be encouraged instead of silent conformity. Student voice and student agency must be deliberately developed. However, such reforms should be implemented through scalable, context-sensitive routines and differentiated institutional support, because unequal school capacity may otherwise turn student-centered reform into another source of educational inequality. Sequencing therefore matters: low-cost routines that are feasible under large classes and assessment pressure should come first, while more demanding dialogic reforms should expand only as teacher support and institutional capacity increase.

Future empirical work should also test whether these routines reduce or reproduce subgroup gaps in voice and participation across gender, socioeconomic, and language-minority lines. The proposed link between classroom mechanisms and macroeconomic outcomes should therefore be read as a long-term conceptual pathway rather than as an empirically established causal chain. Future research may include small-scale classroom pilots and quasi-experiments using targeted nudges and structured pedagogical protocols. In particular, pre/post studies could test whether formative-assessment routines, safe-discussion protocols, and bounded-choice designs strengthen student voice, student agency, constructive error climate, and willingness to participate under uncertainty.

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Appendix

Appendix A. Search Strategy and Source Selection Procedure

Appendix A1. Databases and Source Platforms

The search was conducted in Scopus, Web of Science, ERIC, and Google Scholar, supplemented by targeted searches of OECD, Eurydice, the U.S. Department of Education, the German Eurydice/KMK documentation, and selected Ukrainian education-reform and policy sources. Database searches were used primarily to identify peer-reviewed studies, whereas institutional and policy-platform searches were used mainly to identify governance documents, assessment frameworks, reform materials, and country-specific contextual sources relevant to Germany, the U.S., and Ukraine.

Appendix A2. Search Scope and Date Range

Searching and source updating were conducted between January and April 2026. The main publication window prioritized sources published between 2020 and 2025, including ahead-of-print or early online 2025 publications where relevant. Earlier works were retained selectively when they were necessary for foundational theoretical concepts, including prospect theory, choice architecture, motivation crowding, preference falsification, and the distinction between student voice and student agency.

Appendix A3. Search Strings and Keyword Logic

The search strategy combined terms related to the article’s conceptual focus, focal mechanisms, and country scope. Core search combinations included the following examples:

• “choice architecture” AND education
• “student voice” AND school
• “student agency” AND school
• “loss aversion” AND students
• “fear of mistakes” AND classroom
• “error climate” AND school
• “conformity” AND classroom
• “preference falsification” AND education
• “formative assessment” AND school
• “formative assessment” AND Ukraine
• “classroom discussion” AND United States
• “civic education” AND Germany
• “Beutelsbach Consensus”
• “New Ukrainian School”
• “error climate” AND Germany

Backward and forward citation tracking was also used to identify directly relevant sources that were not captured in the initial database searches.

Appendix A4. Screening Stages and Inclusion/Exclusion Logic

Records were screened in four stages:

• Stage 1: Identification of potentially relevant records through database and institutional-platform searches;
• Stage 2: Removal of duplicates and clearly irrelevant records;
• Stage 3: Title and abstract screening; and
• Stage 4: Full-text eligibility assessment followed by final analytical inclusion.

To be included, a source had to meet all of the following criteria:

1. substantive relevance to at least one focal mechanism of the study (choice architecture, incentives and sanctions, fear of mistakes/loss aversion, social conformity and preference falsification, or student agency/student voice);
2. empirical, conceptual, or policy-analytical relevance to school education;
3. sufficient methodological or institutional transparency to support analytical use;
4. direct relevance to Germany, the U.S., or Ukraine, or clear comparative relevance for interpreting these cases; and
5. compatibility with the study’s behavioral-economic framing.

Sources were excluded if they were duplicative, only marginally related to the research questions, journalistic or purely opinion-based, insufficiently transparent for analytical use, or not sufficiently aligned with the article’s three-country comparative scope and focal behavioral mechanisms.

Appendix A5. Selection Counts and PRISMA-Lite Flow

A total of 120 records were identified through database and targeted institutional-platform searches. After duplicate removal and preliminary relevance screening, 50 records were excluded. The remaining 70 sources were retained for analytical use after full-text or document-level eligibility assessment. During the final policy-source updating stage, three additional recent OECD sources were added to the already existing set of institutional and policy references in order to strengthen contemporaneity and policy relevance. Therefore, the final analytical corpus cited in the revised manuscript comprised 73 sources.

The source-selection flow was as follows:

• Records identified through database and targeted institutional-platform searches: n = 120.
• Records excluded after duplicate removal and preliminary relevance screening: n = 50.
• Sources retained after full-text or document-level eligibility assessment: n = 70.
• Additional recent OECD policy sources added during final updating: n = 3.
• Final analytical corpus included in the revised manuscript: n = 73.

Appendix A6. Composition of the Final Corpus and Evidential Status

The final corpus comprised 73 sources, including:

• 55 peer-reviewed journal articles;
• 16 official or institutional policy sources;
• 1 scholarly book chapter;
• 1 scholarly monograph.

Of these 73 sources, 53 were published between 2020 and 2025. Earlier works were retained selectively as foundational theoretical references rather than as primary evidence for current classroom practices

For evidential transparency, the manuscript distinguishes between different types of claims. Empirical claims refer to statements grounded directly in peer-reviewed studies, meta-analyses, validation studies, and official comparative reports describing observed educational practices, measured outcomes, or institutional conditions. Conceptual interpretations refer to broader cross-source generalizations, integrative comparisons across the three national cases, and heuristic causal propositions linking classroom-level mechanisms to downstream educational, behavioral, and economic outcomes. Official policy and institutional sources were used primarily to describe governance arrangements, assessment systems, reform architecture, and contextual conditions rather than as substitutes for classroom-level empirical evidence.

Appendix B. Illustrative Measurement Notes for Future Empirical Testing

The following examples are not items used in the present conceptual review. They illustrate how the constructs in Table 3 could be operationalized in a future pilot study.

Student Voice: Possible response format: 5-point Likert scale from 1 = strongly disagree to 5 = strongly agree.

Example adapted item: “In this class, students have opportunities to express ideas about learning activities.”

Student Agency: Possible response format: 5-point Likert scale.

Example adapted item: “When I do not understand something, I ask questions or suggest another way to approach the task.”

Discussion Safety: Possible response format: 5-point Likert scale.

Example adapted item: “I can express a different opinion in class without being ridiculed.”

Error Climate/Fear of Mistakes: Possible response format: 5-point Likert scale.

Example adapted item: “When students make mistakes, the class uses them to understand the topic better.”

Tolerance of Ambiguity/Uncertainty: Possible response format: short scenario-based scale.

Example prompt: “The teacher asks an open question with more than one possible answer. How willing would you be to share your idea before knowing whether it is correct?”

These examples should be treated as draft operationalizations. A future empirical study should report internal consistency, factor structure where applicable, and evidence of age and language appropriateness before using the scales for hypothesis testing.