Mothers Care More, but Fathers Decide: Educating Parents about Child Health in Uganda

Martina Björkman Nyqvist and Seema Jayachandran

American Economic Review, 2017, vol. 107, issue 5, 496-500

Abstract: Research on intrahousehold decision-making generally finds that fathers have more bargaining power than mothers, but mothers put more weight on children's well-being. This suggests a tradeoff when targeting policies to improve child health: fathers have more power to change household behavior in ways that improve child health, but mothers might have a stronger desire to do so. This paper compares health classes in Uganda that enrolled either mothers or fathers. We find that educating mothers leads to greater adoption of health-promoting behaviors by the household. In addition, educating one parent leads to positive spillovers on the other spouse's health behaviors.

JEL-codes: H51 I11 I14 I18 J12 J13 O15 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
Note: DOI: 10.1257/aer.p20171103
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (16)

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