IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/eab/develo/22946.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Socio-Economic Characteristics of the Tall and not so Tall Women of India

Author

Listed:
  • Brinda Viswanathan

    (MSE)

  • Viney Sharma

Abstract

New studies are increasingly appearing based on historical data across the world that better socio-economic status is associated with taller men and women. This study based on a recent Indian data analyses the variations in height among adult women. The main findings show that regional level differences in mean heights are prominent and contiguous regions show similar mean heights after controlling for socio-economic differences. Women from weaker socio-economic groups are shorter and so are women in rural areas though the rural-urban gap disappears after controlling for socio-economic variations. Women who have had at least one child during teenage have lower average heights but this difference is not statistically significant once differences in education are accounted for.

Suggested Citation

  • Brinda Viswanathan & Viney Sharma, 2009. "Socio-Economic Characteristics of the Tall and not so Tall Women of India," Development Economics Working Papers 22946, East Asian Bureau of Economic Research.
    • Handle: RePEc:eab:develo:22946
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.eaber.org/node/22946
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Dinda, Soumyananda & Gangopadhyay, P.K. & Chattopadhyay, B.P. & Saiyed, H.N. & Pal, M. & Bharati, P., 2006. "Height, weight and earnings among coalminers in India," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 4(3), pages 342-350, December.
    2. repec:pri:rpdevs:deaton_height_health_inequality_revised_ack_jan08.pdf is not listed on IDEAS
    3. John Komlos, "undated". "Stature and Nutrition in the Habsburg Monarchy: The Standard of Living and Economic Development," Articles by John Komlos 36, Department of Economics, University of Munich.
    4. Baten, Jorg & Murray, John E., 2000. "Heights of Men and Women in 19th-Century Bavaria: Economic, Nutritional, and Disease Influences," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 37(4), pages 351-369, October.
    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. Brinda Viswanathan, 2014. "Variations in Women’s Heights across Social and Religious Groups Among Indian States," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 119(2), pages 1149-1169, November.

    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. Jacobs, Jan & Tassenaar, Vincent, 2004. "Height, income, and nutrition in the Netherlands: the second half of the 19th century," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 2(2), pages 181-195, June.
    2. Stegl, Mojgan & Baten, Joerg, 2009. "Tall and shrinking Muslims, short and growing Europeans: The long-run welfare development of the Middle East, 1850-1980," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 46(1), pages 132-148, January.
    3. Carson, Scott Alan, 2011. "Height of female Americans in the 19th century and the antebellum puzzle," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 9(2), pages 157-164, March.
    4. Brinda Viswanathan & Viney Sharma, 2009. "Socio-Economic Characteristics of the Tall and not so Tall Women of India," Working Papers 2009-041, Madras School of Economics,Chennai,India.
    5. Hiermeyer, Martin, 2008. "The trade-off between a high and an equal biological standard of living--Evidence from Germany," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 6(3), pages 431-445, December.
    6. Lantzsch, Jana & Schuster, Klaus, 2009. "Socioeconomic status and physical stature in 19th-century Bavaria," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 7(1), pages 46-54, March.
    7. Brinda Viswanathan & Viney Sharma, 2009. "Socio-economic Differences in Heights of Adult Indian Women," Journal of Developing Societies, , vol. 25(4), pages 421-455, October.
    8. Steckel, Richard H., 2009. "Heights and human welfare: Recent developments and new directions," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 46(1), pages 1-23, January.
    9. Komlos, John, 2019. "Shrinking in a growing economy is not so puzzling after all," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 32(C), pages 40-55.
    10. Baten, Joerg & Maravall, Laura, 2021. "The influence of colonialism on Africa's welfare: An anthropometric study," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 49(3), pages 751-775.
    11. Baten, Joerg, 2009. "Protein supply and nutritional status in nineteenth century Bavaria, Prussia and France," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 7(2), pages 165-180, July.
    12. Moradi, Alexander & Baten, Joerg, 2005. "Inequality in Sub-Saharan Africa: New Data and New Insights from Anthropometric Estimates," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 33(8), pages 1233-1265, August.
    13. de Beer, Hans, 2004. "Observations on the history of Dutch physical stature from the late-Middle Ages to the present," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 2(1), pages 45-55, March.
    14. Brinda Viswanathan & Viney Sharma, 2011. "Socio-Economic Characteristics of the Tall and not so Tall Women of India," Working Papers id:4302, eSocialSciences.
    15. Federico, Giovanni, 2003. "Heights, calories and welfare: a new perspective on Italian industrialization, 1854-1913," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 1(3), pages 289-308, December.
    16. Brinda Viswanathan, 2014. "Variations in Women’s Heights across Social and Religious Groups Among Indian States," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 119(2), pages 1149-1169, November.
    17. Komlos, John & Cinnirella, Francesco, 2005. "European Heights in the Early 18th Century," Discussion Papers in Economics 572, University of Munich, Department of Economics.
    18. Bassino, Jean-Pascal, 2006. "Inequality in Japan (1892-1941): Physical stature, income, and health," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 4(1), pages 62-88, January.
    19. Elisabetta De Cao, 2015. "The Height Production Function from Birth to Age Two," Journal of Human Capital, University of Chicago Press, vol. 9(3), pages 329-363.
    20. Tao, Hung-Lin, 2014. "Height, weight, and entry earnings of female graduates in Taiwan," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 13(C), pages 85-98.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • J11 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Demographic Trends, Macroeconomic Effects, and Forecasts
    • J16 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination
    • I31 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - General Welfare, Well-Being
    • R11 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - Regional Economic Activity: Growth, Development, Environmental Issues, and Changes
    • R29 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Household Analysis - - - Other

    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:eab:develo:22946. 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: Shiro Armstrong (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/eaberau.html .

    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.