IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/aah/aarhec/2012-23.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

How Distance to a Non-Residential Parent Relates to Child Outcomes

Author

Listed:
  • Astrid Würtz Rasmussen

    (Department of Economics and Business, Aarhus University, Denmark)

  • Leslie S. Stratton

    (Virginia Commonwealth University)

Abstract

Family courts now encourage both parents to maintain contact with their children following separation/divorce, driven by the belief that such contact benefits the child. We test this assumption with a population sample of children from nonnuclear families in Denmark, using distance between non-residential parents and their children to proxy for contact. The results indicate significantly better educational and behavioral outcomes for children at a greater distance. Failing to control for endogeneity biases the results in favor of more proximate parents. These findings suggest that policy efforts to keep separated parents geographically closer for their children’s sake may not be advantageous.

Suggested Citation

  • Astrid Würtz Rasmussen & Leslie S. Stratton, 2012. "How Distance to a Non-Residential Parent Relates to Child Outcomes," Economics Working Papers 2012-23, Department of Economics and Business Economics, Aarhus University.
    • Handle: RePEc:aah:aarhec:2012-23
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://repec.econ.au.dk/repec/afn/wp/12/wp12_23.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Corak, Miles, 2001. "Death and Divorce: The Long-Term Consequences of Parental Loss on Adolescents," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 19(3), pages 682-715, July.
    2. Ariel Kalil & Magne Mogstad & Mari Rege & Mark Votruba, 2011. "Divorced Fathers’ Proximity and Children’s Long-Run Outcomes: Evidence From Norwegian Registry Data," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 48(3), pages 1005-1027, August.
    3. Maria Cancian & Daniel Meyer, 1998. "Who gets custody?," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 35(2), pages 147-157, May.
    4. Sandra Hofferth & Angela Pinzon, 2011. "Do Nonresidential Fathers’ Financial Support and Contact Improve Children’s Health?," Journal of Family and Economic Issues, Springer, vol. 32(2), pages 280-295, June.
    5. Jacob, Brian A., 2002. "Where the boys aren't: non-cognitive skills, returns to school and the gender gap in higher education," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 21(6), pages 589-598, December.
    6. Brian A. Jacob, 2002. "Where the boys aren't: Non-cognitive skills, returns to school and the gender gap in higher education," NBER Working Papers 8964, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Elizabeth Cooksey & Patricia Craig, 1998. "Parenting from a distance: The effects of paternal characteristics on contact between nonresidential fathers and their children," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 35(2), pages 187-200, May.
    8. Sandra Hofferth, 2006. "Residential father family type and child well-being: Investment versus selection," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 43(1), pages 53-77, February.
    9. Heather Antecol & Kelly Bedard, 2007. "Does single parenthood increase the probability of teenage promiscuity, substance use, and crime?," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 20(1), pages 55-71, February.
    10. Joseph Price, 2008. "Parent-Child Quality Time: Does Birth Order Matter?," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 43(1).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Astrid Würtz Rasmussen & Leslie S. Stratton, 2016. "How distance to a non-resident parent relates to child outcomes," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 14(4), pages 829-857, December.
    2. Laura Giuliano, 2007. "The Demand for Sons or the Demand for Fathers? Understanding the Effects of Child Gender on Divorce Rates," Working Papers 0724, University of Miami, Department of Economics.
    3. Michael Baker & Kevin Milligan, 2016. "Boy-Girl Differences in Parental Time Investments: Evidence from Three Countries," Journal of Human Capital, University of Chicago Press, vol. 10(4), pages 399-441.
    4. Deborah Cobb-Clark & Erdal Tekin, 2014. "Fathers and youths’ delinquent behavior," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 12(2), pages 327-358, June.
    5. Kelly Bedard & Allison Witman, 2020. "Family structure and the gender gap in ADHD," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 18(4), pages 1101-1129, December.
    6. Andrew J. Bibler, 2020. "Household Composition and Gender Differences in Parental Time Investments," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 57(4), pages 1415-1435, August.
    7. Andrew Bibler, 2017. "Household Composition and Gender Difference in Parental Time Investments," Working Papers 2017-01, University of Alaska Anchorage, Department of Economics.
    8. Ragni Hege Kitterød & Jan Lyngstad, 2011. "Untraditional caring arrangements among parents living apart. The case of Norway," Discussion Papers 660, Statistics Norway, Research Department.
    9. Letizia Mencarini & Silvia Pasqua & Agnese Romiti, 2019. "Single-mother families and the gender gap in children’s time investment and non-cognitive skills," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 17(1), pages 149-176, March.
    10. Didier Fouarge & Trudie Schils & Andries de Grip, 2013. "Why do low-educated workers invest less in further training?," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 45(18), pages 2587-2601, June.
    11. Huong Thu Le & Ha Trong Nguyen, 2018. "The evolution of the gender test score gap through seventh grade: new insights from Australia using unconditional quantile regression and decomposition," IZA Journal of Labor Economics, Springer;Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 7(1), pages 1-42, December.
    12. Hinrichs, Peter, 2021. "What kind of teachers are schools looking for? Evidence from a randomized field experiment," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 186(C), pages 395-411.
    13. Zeman, Klarka & Frenette, Marc, 2007. "Why Are Most University Students Women? Evidence Based on Academic Performance, Study Habits and Parental Influences," Analytical Studies Branch Research Paper Series 2007303e, Statistics Canada, Analytical Studies Branch.
    14. Natalie Lecy & Philip Osteen, 2022. "The Effects of Childhood Trauma on College Completion," Research in Higher Education, Springer;Association for Institutional Research, vol. 63(6), pages 1058-1072, September.
    15. Alena Bicakova & Stepan Jurajda, 2014. "The Quiet Revolution and the Family: Gender Composition of Tertiary Education and Early Fertility Patterns," CERGE-EI Working Papers wp504, The Center for Economic Research and Graduate Education - Economics Institute, Prague.
    16. Nicholas W. Papageorge & Seth Gershenson & Kyung Min Kang, 2020. "Teacher Expectations Matter," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 102(2), pages 234-251, May.
    17. Aucejo, Esteban & James, Jonathan, 2018. "Catching Up to Girls: Understanding the Gender Imbalance in Educational Attainment Within Race," CEPR Discussion Papers 13123, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    18. Christofides, Louis N. & Hoy, Michael & Yang, Ling, 2010. "Participation in Canadian Universities: The gender imbalance (1977-2005)," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 29(3), pages 400-410, June.
    19. Edwards, Rebecca & Gibson, Rachael & Harmon, Colm & Schurer, Stefanie, 2022. "First-in-their-family students at university: Can non-cognitive skills compensate for social origin?," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 91(C).
    20. Steven J. Haider & Kathleen McGarry, 2018. "Parental Investments in College and Later Cash Transfers," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 55(5), pages 1705-1725, October.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Child outcomes; parental separation; distance;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D13 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Household Production and Intrahouse Allocation
    • I12 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health Behavior
    • I21 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Analysis of Education
    • J12 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Marriage; Marital Dissolution; Family Structure
    • J13 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Fertility; Family Planning; Child Care; Children; Youth

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:aah:aarhec:2012-23. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.econ.au.dk/afn/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.