Duc Le Thuc, Behrman Jere R
Centre for Analysis and Forecasting, Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences, No.1, Lieu Giai Road, Hanoi, Viet Nam.
Economics and Sociology Departments and Population Studies Center, University of Pennsylvania, McNeil 160, 3718 Locust Walk, Philadelphia, PA 19104-6297, USA.
Econ Hum Biol. 2017 Aug;26:86-95. doi: 10.1016/j.ehb.2017.02.002. Epub 2017 Mar 11.
We utilize longitudinal data on nearly 1800 children in Vietnam to study the predictive power of alternative measures of early childhood undernutrition for outcomes at age eight years: weight-for-age (WAZ8), height-for-age (HAZ8), and education (reading, math and receptive vocabulary). We apply two-stage procedures to derive unpredicted weight gain and height growth in the first year of life. Our estimates show that a standard deviation (SD) increase in birth weight is associated with an increase of 0.14 (standard error [SE]: 0.03) in WAZ8 and 0.12 (SE: 0.02) in HAZ8. These are significantly lower than the corresponding figures for a SD increase in unpredicted weight gain: 0.51 (SE: 0.02) and 0.33 (SE: 0.02). The heterogeneity of the predictive power of early childhood nutrition indicators for mid-childhood outcomes reflects both life-cycle considerations (prenatal versus postnatal) and the choice of anthropometric measure (height versus weight). Even though all the nutritional indicators that involve postnatal nutritional status are important predictors for all the mid-childhood outcomes, there are some important differences between the indicators on weight and height. The magnitude of associations with the outcomes is one aspect of the heterogeneity. More importantly there is a component of height-for-age z-score (at age 12 months) that adds predictive power for all the mid-childhood outcomes beyond that of birth weight and weight gain in the first year of life.
我们利用越南近1800名儿童的纵向数据，研究幼儿期营养不良的替代指标对8岁时各项结果的预测能力：年龄别体重（WAZ8）、年龄别身高（HAZ8）和教育程度（阅读、数学和接受性词汇）。我们采用两阶段程序来得出生命第一年中未预测到的体重增加和身高增长情况。我们的估计表明，出生体重增加一个标准差（SD），WAZ8增加0.14（标准误[SE]：0.03），HAZ8增加0.12（SE：0.02）。这些数值显著低于未预测到的体重增加一个标准差时的相应数值：0.51（SE：0.02）和0.33（SE：0.02）。幼儿期营养指标对童年中期结果预测能力的异质性既反映了生命周期因素（产前与产后），也反映了人体测量指标的选择（身高与体重）。尽管所有涉及产后营养状况的营养指标都是童年中期所有结果的重要预测因素，但体重和身高指标之间存在一些重要差异。与结果的关联程度是异质性的一个方面。更重要的是，年龄别身高z评分（12个月时）的一个组成部分为童年中期所有结果增加了超出出生体重和生命第一年体重增加的预测能力。
