IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/plo/pone00/0291300.html

Proximal determinants of suboptimal early child development during the first three years of life in socially deprived Mexican contexts

Author

Listed:
  • Edson Serván-Mori
  • Amado D Quezada-Sánchez
  • Evelyn Fuentes-Rivera
  • Carlos Pineda-Antunez
  • María del Carmen Hernández-Chávez
  • Angélica García-Martínez
  • Raquel García-Feregrino
  • Abby Madrigal
  • Bárbara Guerrero
  • Gerónimo Medrano
  • Lourdes Schnaas

Abstract

Assessing the status and determinants of early child development (ECD) requires accurate and regularly updated measurements. Yet, little information has been published on the subject in low- and middle-income countries, particularly regarding the proximal determinants of childhood development in contexts of high social marginalization. This article analyzes the factors that favor or mitigate suboptimal ECD outcomes in Mexico. A cross-sectional study was conducted using recently collected data for 918 children aged 0–38 months from socially marginalized communities in 23 Mexican municipalities. The ECD outcomes of the children were estimated based on indicators of chronic undernutrition and neurodevelopment (normal, lagging and at risk of delay). The distribution of outcomes was described across the ECD proximal determinants analyzed, including the co-occurrence of chronic undernutrition and suboptimal neurodevelopment. Covariate-adjusted prevalence of the ECD outcomes and co-occurrences were calculated as post-estimations from a multiple multinomial logistic regression. The prevalence of chronic undernutrition was 23.5%; 45.9% of children were classified with neurodevelopmental lag, and 11% at risk of neurodevelopmental delay. The prevalence of stunting co-occurring with suboptimal neurodevelopment came to 15.4%. The results of the multinomial logistic regression model indicated that early gestational age, low birth weight, a low household socioeconomic level, being male and having numerous siblings were all associated with the co-occurrence of chronic undernutrition and suboptimal child neurodevelopment. This study identified important predictors of child development in the first three years of life, specifically in two of its principal indicators: nutritional and neurodevelopmental status. Most of the predictors observed can be improved by means of social programs and interventions.Trial registration: ClinicalTrials.gov ID: NCT04210362.

Suggested Citation

  • Edson Serván-Mori & Amado D Quezada-Sánchez & Evelyn Fuentes-Rivera & Carlos Pineda-Antunez & María del Carmen Hernández-Chávez & Angélica García-Martínez & Raquel García-Feregrino & Abby Madrigal & B, 2023. "Proximal determinants of suboptimal early child development during the first three years of life in socially deprived Mexican contexts," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 18(11), pages 1-19, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0291300
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0291300
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0291300
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0291300&type=printable
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1371/journal.pone.0291300?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
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. William Rogers, 1994. "Regression standard errors in clustered samples," Stata Technical Bulletin, StataCorp LLC, vol. 3(13).
    2. de Haan, Monique, 2010. "Birth order, family size and educational attainment," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 29(4), pages 576-588, August.
    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. Ea Hoppe Blaabæk & Mads Meier Jæger & Joseph Molitoris, 2020. "Family Size and Educational Attainment: Cousins, Contexts, and Compensation," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 36(3), pages 575-600, July.
    2. Beck, Thorsten & Poelhekke, Steven, 2023. "Follow the money: Does the financial sector intermediate natural resource windfalls?," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 130(C).
    3. Elsa GAUTRAIN & Hugues CHAMPEAUX & Karine MARAZYAN, 2024. "Men's premarital migration and marriage payments: Evidence from Indonesia," FSES Working Papers 534, Faculty of Economics and Social Sciences, University of Freiburg/Fribourg Switzerland.
    4. Adriana D. Kugler & Santosh Kumar, 2017. "Preference for Boys, Family Size, and Educational Attainment in India," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 54(3), pages 835-859, June.
    5. Klein, Aleksandra, 2025. "Team structural control and team resilience: An empirical study of creative project-based teams," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 186(C).
    6. Talosaga Talosaga & Mark Vink, 2014. "The Effect of Public Pension Eligibility Age on Household Saving: Evidence from a New Zealand Natural Experiment," Treasury Working Paper Series 14/21, New Zealand Treasury.
    7. Marco Bertoni & Giorgio Brunello, 2016. "Later-borns Don’t Give Up: The Temporary Effects of Birth Order on European Earnings," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 53(2), pages 449-470, April.
    8. Christina Robinson, 2013. "Younger Siblings Can Be Good for Your Health: An Examination of Spillover Benefits from the Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC)," Journal of Family and Economic Issues, Springer, vol. 34(2), pages 172-184, June.
    9. Chen, Yang & Regis, Paulo José, 2014. "Strategic interactions in corporate tax between Chinese local governments," RIEI Working Papers 2014-01, Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University, Research Institute for Economic Integration, revised 27 Oct 2015.
    10. Sun, Ang & Yao, Yang, 2010. "Health shocks and children's school attainments in rural China," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 29(3), pages 375-382, June.
    11. Azam Mehtabul & Hang Saing Chan, 2018. "Is There Really a Trade-Off? Family Size and Investment in Child Quality in India," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 18(1), pages 1-12, January.
    12. Heather Congdon Fors & Annika Lindskog, 2023. "Within‐family inequalities in human capital accumulation in India," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27(1), pages 3-28, February.
    13. Bloem, Michael D. & Holbein, John B. & Imlay, Samuel J. & Smith, Jonathan, 2025. "Voting Among Siblings," IZA Discussion Papers 17962, IZA Network @ LISER.
    14. Florian Heine & Martin Sefton, 2018. "To Tender or Not to Tender? Deliberate and Exogenous Sunk Costs in a Public Good Game," Games, MDPI, vol. 9(3), pages 1-28, June.
    15. Lucio Esposito & Sunil Mitra Kumar & Adrián Villaseñor, 2020. "The importance of being earliest: birth order and educational outcomes along the socioeconomic ladder in Mexico," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 33(3), pages 1069-1099, July.
    16. Mari, Gabriele, 2023. "Less for more? Cuts to child benefits, family adjustments, and long-run child outcomes in larger families," SocArXiv e3n82, Center for Open Science.
    17. Enkelejda Havari & Marco Savegnago, 2022. "The intergenerational effects of birth order on education," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 35(1), pages 349-377, January.
    18. Sara Cools & Rannveig Kaldager Hart, 2015. "The effect of childhood family size on fertility in adulthood. New evidence form IV estimation," Discussion Papers 802, Statistics Norway, Research Department.
    19. Sumaryanto & Sri Hery Susilowati & Fitri Nurfatriani & Herlina Tarigan & Erwidodo & Tahlim Sudaryanto & Henri Wira Perkasa, 2022. "Determinants of Farmers’ Behavior towards Land Conservation Practices in the Upper Citarum Watershed in West Java, Indonesia," Land, MDPI, vol. 11(10), pages 1-21, October.
    20. Hussain, Hafezali Iqbal & Ali, Mohsin & Hassan, M. Kabir & El-Khatib, Rwan, 2023. "Asymmetric capital structure speed of adjustment, equity mispricing and Shari’ah compliance of Malaysian firms," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 86(C), pages 965-975.

    More about this item

    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:plo:pone00:0291300. 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: plosone (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/ .

    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.