Reynolds Sarah A, Fernald Lia C H, Behrman Jere R
Division of Community Health Sciences, School of Public Health, University of California, 50 University Hall, Berkeley, CA 94720-7360, United States.
Economics and Sociology Departments, School of Arts and Sciences, University of Pennsylvania, 160 McNeil Building, 3718 Locust Walk, Philadelphia, PA 19104-6297, United States.
SSM Popul Health. 2017 Sep 18;3:756-766. doi: 10.1016/j.ssmph.2017.08.010. eCollection 2017 Dec.
This paper examines associations between labor market participation of Chilean mothers and the cognitive, language, and socio-economic development of their children. Using a nationally-representative sample of 3-year-old children, we test if mothers' work intensity in the two previous years is associated with child development outcomes; data were collected in 2010 when children were one year old, and again in 2012, when they were three years old. We find that children who were three years old with mothers who worked for higher fractions of their children's lives in the previous two years perform significantly better on all tests (cognitive, language, socio-emotional) than children whose mothers had worked less, while controlling for baseline test performance. These main effects did not remain significant with the inclusion of a wide range of socio-economic, demographic control variables, however. Our results were similarly null when using an IV analysis or a propensity score matching approach. We provide descriptive information on theoretical pathways by which maternal work may influence child development. Though several of these pathways (e.g. preschool, toys, maternal stress) seem to be associated with both maternal work and child development outcomes, the pathways are not sufficiently strong to generate an association between maternal work and child development. We conclude that Chilean mothers' employment in early childhood generally does not have an effect on child development.
本文考察了智利母亲的劳动力市场参与与其子女认知、语言和社会经济发展之间的关联。我们以一个具有全国代表性的3岁儿童样本为基础，检验前两年母亲的工作强度是否与儿童发展结果相关；数据于2010年儿童一岁时收集，2012年儿童三岁时再次收集。我们发现，在前两年中，母亲在其子女生活中工作时间占比更高的3岁儿童，在所有测试（认知、语言、社会情感）中的表现都显著优于母亲工作时间较短的儿童，同时对基线测试表现进行了控制。然而，在纳入一系列社会经济、人口控制变量后，这些主要影响不再显著。当使用工具变量分析或倾向得分匹配方法时，我们的结果同样不显著。我们提供了关于母亲工作可能影响儿童发展的理论途径的描述性信息。尽管其中一些途径（如学前教育、玩具、母亲压力）似乎与母亲工作和儿童发展结果都有关联，但这些途径的影响力不足，无法在母亲工作和儿童发展之间产生关联。我们得出结论，智利母亲在幼儿期就业通常对儿童发展没有影响。
