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Self investments of adolescents and their cognitive development

Author

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  • D. Del Boca
  • C. Monfardini
  • C. Nicoletti

Abstract

While a large literature has focused on the impact of parental investments on child cognitive development, very little is known about the role of child's own in- vestments. Information on how children invest their time separately from parents is probably little informative for babies and toddlers, but it becomes more and more important in later stages of life, such as adolescence, when children start to take decisions independently. By using the Child Development Supplement of the PSID (Panel Study of Income Dynamics), we model the production of cognitive ability of adolescents and extend the set of inputs to include the child's own time investments. Looking at investments during adolescence, we find that child's investments matter more than mother's investments. On the contrary, looking at investments during childhood, it is the mother's investments that are more important. Our results are obtained accounting for potential unobserved child's and family's endowments and are robust across several specifications and samples, e.g. considering and not considering father's investments and non-intact families.

Suggested Citation

  • D. Del Boca & C. Monfardini & C. Nicoletti, 2012. "Self investments of adolescents and their cognitive development," CHILD Working Papers Series 5, Centre for Household, Income, Labour and Demographic Economics (CHILD) - CCA.
  • Handle: RePEc:cca:wchild:5
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    Cited by:

    1. Ylenia Brilli, 2022. "Mother’s Time Allocation, Childcare, and Child Cognitive Development," Journal of Human Capital, University of Chicago Press, vol. 16(2), pages 233-272.
    2. Fuchs, Benjamin, 2015. "The Effect of Teenage Employment on Character Skills and Occupational Choice Strategies," VfS Annual Conference 2015 (Muenster): Economic Development - Theory and Policy 113030, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    3. Emilia Del Bono & Marco Francesconi & Yvonne Kelly & Amanda Sacker, 2016. "Early Maternal Time Investment and Early Child Outcomes," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 126(596), pages 96-135, October.
    4. Peter Funk & Thorsten Kemper, 2016. "Leisure and Learning - Activities and Their Effects on Child Skill Development," Working Paper Series in Economics 85, University of Cologne, Department of Economics.
    5. Holford, Angus, 2015. "Youth employment and academic performance: production functions and policy effects," ISER Working Paper Series 2015-06, Institute for Social and Economic Research.
    6. Ylenia Brilli, 2012. "Public and parental investments in children. Evidence from the literature on non-parental child care," CHILD Working Papers Series 6, Centre for Household, Income, Labour and Demographic Economics (CHILD) - CCA.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    time-use; cognitive ability; child development; adolescence;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J13 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Fertility; Family Planning; Child Care; Children; Youth
    • D1 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior

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