IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/cysrev/v121y2021ics0190740920321691.html

Poverty exposure and cognitive abilities of children in rural China: Causation and the roles of family investments

Author

Listed:
  • Li, Yunsen
  • Yang, Haoran
  • Luo, Liang

Abstract

Family poverty may affect family investments, which affect children's cognitive development. Based on a unique and nationally representative sample from the National Children’s Study of China (NCSC), this study aimed to explore the relationship between poverty and children’s cognitive abilities and the roles of different investments to the cognitive gaps. We had the following three findings. First, the cognitive abilities of children in poor families were significantly and negatively affected by their families’ poverty status. Second, poverty was significantly correlated with lower family education expenditures, lower expectations of parents for their children’s education, and more permissive parenting styles. Finally, the results of the Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition method showed that family educational expenditures, educational expectations, and permissive parenting styles accounted for substantial portions of the gaps in cognitive abilities.

Suggested Citation

  • Li, Yunsen & Yang, Haoran & Luo, Liang, 2021. "Poverty exposure and cognitive abilities of children in rural China: Causation and the roles of family investments," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 121(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:cysrev:v:121:y:2021:i:c:s0190740920321691
    DOI: 10.1016/j.childyouth.2020.105747
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0190740920321691
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.childyouth.2020.105747?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Zhang, Haochen & Qin, Xuezheng & Zhou, Jiantao, 2020. "Do tiger moms raise superior kids? The impact of parenting style on adolescent human capital formation in China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 63(C).
    2. Mario Fiorini & Michael P. Keane, 2014. "How the Allocation of Children's Time Affects Cognitive and Noncognitive Development," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 32(4), pages 787-836.
    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. Matthias Doepke & Giuseppe Sorrenti & Fabrizio Zilibotti, 2019. "The Economics of Parenting," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 11(1), pages 55-84, August.
    5. Ben Jann, 2008. "A Stata implementation of the Blinder-Oaxaca decomposition," ETH Zurich Sociology Working Papers 5, ETH Zurich, Chair of Sociology, revised 14 May 2008.
    6. Patricio S. Dalton & Sayantan Ghosal & Anandi Mani, 2016. "Poverty and Aspirations Failure," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 126(590), pages 165-188, February.
    7. Hongbin Li & Junsen Zhang & Yi Zhu, 2008. "The quantity-Quality trade-Off of children In a developing country: Identification using chinese twins," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 45(1), pages 223-243, February.
    8. Glauben, Thomas & Herzfeld, Thomas & Rozelle, Scott & Wang, Xiaobing, 2012. "Persistent Poverty in Rural China: Where, Why, and How to Escape?," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 40(4), pages 784-795.
    9. James S. Coleman, 1968. "Equality of Educational Opportunity: Reply to Bowles and Levin," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 3(2), pages 237-246.
    10. Flavio Cunha & James J. Heckman, 2009. "The Economics and Psychology of Inequality and Human DEvelopment," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 7(2-3), pages 320-364, 04-05.
    11. James J. Heckman, 2008. "Schools, Skills, And Synapses," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 46(3), pages 289-324, July.
    12. Roger Klein & Francis Vella, 2009. "A semiparametric model for binary response and continuous outcomes under index heteroscedasticity," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 24(5), pages 735-762.
    13. Oaxaca, Ronald, 1973. "Male-Female Wage Differentials in Urban Labor Markets," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 14(3), pages 693-709, October.
    14. Raj Chetty & Nathaniel Hendren & Lawrence F. Katz, 2016. "The Effects of Exposure to Better Neighborhoods on Children: New Evidence from the Moving to Opportunity Experiment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 106(4), pages 855-902, April.
    15. Rui Zhao & Yaohui Zhao, 2018. "The Gender Pension Gap in China," Feminist Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 24(2), pages 218-239, April.
    16. Dasgupta, Partha, 1997. "Nutritional status, the capacity for work, and poverty traps," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 77(1), pages 5-37, March.
    17. Daniela Del Boca & Christopher Flinn & Matthew Wiswall, 2014. "Household Choices and Child Development," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 81(1), pages 137-185.
    18. Liu, Xiaoying & Hannum, Emily, 2017. "Early poverty exposure predicts young adult educational outcomes in China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 79-97.
    19. Matthias Doepke & Fabrizio Zilibotti, 2017. "Parenting With Style: Altruism and Paternalism in Intergenerational Preference Transmission," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 85, pages 1331-1371, September.
    20. Xiaogang Wu & Donald Treiman, 2004. "The household registration system and social stratification in China: 1955–1996," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 41(2), pages 363-384, May.
    21. Johannes Haushofer & Jeremy Shapiro, 2016. "The Short-term Impact of Unconditional Cash Transfers to the Poor: ExperimentalEvidence from Kenya," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 131(4), pages 1973-2042.
    22. Zhao, Guochang & Ye, Jingjing & Li, Zhengyang & Xue, Sen, 2017. "How and why do Chinese urban students outperform their rural counterparts?," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 103-123.
    23. Yuanyuan Chen & Le Wang & Min Zhang, 2018. "Informal search, bad search?: the effects of job search method on wages among rural migrants in urban China," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 31(3), pages 837-876, July.
    24. Alan S. Blinder, 1973. "Wage Discrimination: Reduced Form and Structural Estimates," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 8(4), pages 436-455.
    25. Oaxaca, Ronald L. & Ransom, Michael R., 1994. "On discrimination and the decomposition of wage differentials," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 61(1), pages 5-21, March.
    26. Flavio Cunha & James J. Heckman, 2009. "The Economics & Psychology of Inequality and Human Development," Working Papers 200905, Geary Institute, University College Dublin.
    27. Alessandro Lizzeri & Marciano Siniscalchi, 2008. "Parental Guidance and Supervised Learning," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 123(3), pages 1161-1195.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Zhao, Chunkai & Chen, Boou & Song, Zhiyong, 2024. "School nutritious feeding and cognitive abilities of students in poverty: Evidence from the nutrition improvement program in China," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 159(C).
    2. Wang, Yao & Du, Zhili, 2024. "Has energy poverty entangled the households by hindering the filial generation?," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 186(C).
    3. Alina Źróbek-Różańska & Marek Ogryzek & Anna Źróbek-Sokolnik, 2022. "Creating a Healthy Environment for Children: GIS Tools for Improving the Quality of the Social Welfare Management System," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(12), pages 1-19, June.

    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. Francesconi, Marco & Heckman, James J, 2015. "Symposium on Child Development and Parental Investment: Introduction," Economics Discussion Papers 16868, University of Essex, Department of Economics.
    2. Ylenia Brilli & Simone Moriconi, 2023. "Culture of Origin, Parenting, and Household Labor Supply," Working Papers 2023: 17, Department of Economics, University of Venice "Ca' Foscari".
    3. James J. Heckman & Stefano Mosso, 2014. "The Economics of Human Development and Social Mobility," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 6(1), pages 689-733, August.
    4. Li, Yunsen & He, Dan & Wang, Yilin & Zhao, Guochang & Yang, Jing, 2024. "Unveiling the shadows: School bullying and students' ability erosions in Chinese compulsory schools," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 88(C).
    5. Ylenia Brilli & Simone Moriconi, 2024. "Culture of Origin, Parenting, and Household Labor Supply," CHILD Working Papers Series 114 JEL Classification: D, Centre for Household, Income, Labour and Demographic Economics (CHILD) - CCA.
    6. Kiessling, Lukas, 2021. "How do parents perceive the returns to parenting styles and neighborhoods?," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 139(C).
    7. Cai, Xiqian & Cheng, Zhengquan & Jiao, Yang, 2025. "Skewed aspirations: The impact of economic inequality within the classroom on students’ academic performance," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 237(C).
    8. Nicoletti, Cheti & Tonei, Valentina, 2020. "Do parental time investments react to changes in child’s skills and health?," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 127(C).
    9. Jakub Picka, 2014. "Problém "public-private pay gap" v České republice [The Public-Private Pay Gap in the Czech Republic]," Politická ekonomie, Prague University of Economics and Business, vol. 2014(5), pages 662-682.
    10. Liliane Bonnal & Rachid Boumahdi & Pascal Favard, 2013. "The easiest way to estimate the Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 20(1), pages 96-101, January.
    11. Jonas Jessen & Christa Katharina Spieß & Sevrin Waights, 2022. "Centre‐Based Care and Parenting Activities," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 84(6), pages 1356-1379, December.
    12. Foster, E. Michael & Hillemeier, Marianne M. & Bai, Yu, 2011. "Explaining the disparity in placement instability among African-American and white children in child welfare: A Blinder-Oaxaca decomposition," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 118-125, January.
    13. Hanewald, Katja & Jia, Ruo & Liu, Zining, 2021. "Why is inequality higher among the old? Evidence from China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 66(C).
    14. Nguyen, Ha Trong & Connelly, Luke & Le, Huong Thu & Mitrou, Francis & Taylor, Catherine L. & Zubrick, Stephen R., 2019. "Sources of ethnicity differences in non-cognitive development in children and adolescents," EconStor Preprints 205801, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    15. Heckman, James J. & Raut, Lakshmi K., 2016. "Intergenerational long-term effects of preschool-structural estimates from a discrete dynamic programming model," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 191(1), pages 164-175.
    16. Debra Shepherd, 2013. "A question of efficiency: decomposing South African reading test scores using PIRLS 2006," Working Papers 20/2013, Stellenbosch University, Department of Economics.
    17. Karolina Goraus & Joanna Tyrowicz, 2014. "Gender Wage Gap in Poland – Can It Be Explained by Differences in Observable Characteristics?," Ekonomia journal, Faculty of Economic Sciences, University of Warsaw, vol. 36.
    18. Gintare Mazeikaite & Cathal O’Donoghue & Denisa M. Sologon, 2019. "The Great Recession, financial strain and self-assessed health in Ireland," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 20(4), pages 579-596, June.
    19. Bobby W. Chung & Jian Zou, 2023. "Understanding spillover of peer parental education: Randomization evidence and mechanisms," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 61(3), pages 496-522, July.
    20. Lin, Carl, 2012. "Less Myth, More Measurement: Decomposing Excess Returns from the 1989 Minimum Wage Hike," IZA Discussion Papers 6269, IZA Network @ LISER.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    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:eee:cysrev:v:121:y:2021:i:c:s0190740920321691. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/childyouth .

    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.