Parental Inputs and Socio-Economic Gaps in Early Child Development

Lindsey Macmillan () and Emma Tominey ()

No 12792, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: By the time children start school, socio-economic gaps are evident in child skills. We document a causal effect of a reform to mothers' education on her child's skills and use mediation analysis to explore the role of parental inputs as mechanisms. The reform shifted mothers' education from no, to a low level of qualifications. Our results suggest that financial resources are an important channel, explaining up to 59% of the effect on child cognitive skills. On top of this, parental investments of health behaviours during pregnancy and monetary investments at home explain a further 14% of the test score gaps.

Keywords: socio-emotional skills; test scores; child development; decomposition; parental inputs; ALSPAC (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D10 I24 J13 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 61 pages
Date: 2019-11
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-neu
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

Published - published in: Journal of Population Economics , 2023, 36, 1513–1543

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Related works:
Journal Article: Parental inputs and socio-economic gaps in early child development (2023)
Working Paper: Parental inputs and socio-economic gaps in early child development (2021)
Working Paper: Parental Inputs and Socio-economic Gaps in Early Child Development (2019)
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