Endowments and parental investments in infancy and early childhood.
This article tests whether parents reinforce or compensate for child endowments. We estimate how the difference in birth weight across siblings impacts specific parental investments: breast-feeding, well-baby visits, immunizations, and preschool attendance. Our results indicate that normal-birthweight children are 5%-11% more likely to receive early childhood parental investments than their low-birth-weight siblings. Moreover, the presence of additional low-birth-weight siblings in the household increases the likelihood of investments such as well-baby visits and immunizations for normal-birth-weight children. These results suggest that parental investments in early childhood tend to reinforce endowment differences.
Datar
Ashlesha
A
RAND Corporation, Santa Monica, CA 90407, USA. datar@rand.org
Kilburn
M Rebecca
MR
Loughran
David S
DS
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001724:Birth Weight; D001942:Breast Feeding; D002662:Child Health Services / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D002675:Child, Preschool; D018479:Early Intervention, Educational / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007114:Immunization / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D007223:Infant; D007224:Infant Care; D007230:Infant, Low Birth Weight; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D016018:Least-Squares Analysis; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D017059:Models, Econometric; D009035:Mothers; D016487:Parenting; D040841:Resource Allocation; D014481:United States