Cognitive Development and Infectious Disease: Gender Differences in Investments and Outcomes

66 Pages Posted: 28 Dec 2013 Last revised: 16 Apr 2023

See all articles by Sonia R. Bhalotra

Sonia R. Bhalotra

IZA Institute of Labor Economics

Atheendar Venkataramani

University of Pennsylvania - Perelman School of Medicine

Abstract

We exploit exogenous variation in the risk of waterborne disease created by implementation of a major water reform in Mexico in 1991 to investigate impacts of infant exposure on indicators of cognitive development and academic achievement in late childhood. We estimate that a one standard deviation reduction in childhood diarrhea mortality rates results in about a 0.1 standard deviation increase in test scores, but only for girls. We show that a reason for the gender differentiated impacts is that the water reform induces parents to make complementary investments in education that favor girls, consistent with their comparative advantage in skilled occupations. The results provide novel evidence of the potential for clean water provision to narrow test score gaps across countries and, within countries, across gender.

Keywords: Mexico, water, diarrhea, cognitive development, test scores, gender, early life health interventions, brain-brawn, dynamic complementarity

JEL Classification: I38, J16, I12, I14, I15, I24, I25, H51

Suggested Citation

Bhalotra, Sonia R. and Venkataramani, Atheendar, Cognitive Development and Infectious Disease: Gender Differences in Investments and Outcomes. IZA Discussion Paper No. 7833, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2372542 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2372542

Sonia R. Bhalotra (Contact Author)

IZA Institute of Labor Economics ( email )

P.O. Box 7240
Bonn, D-53072
Germany

Atheendar Venkataramani

University of Pennsylvania - Perelman School of Medicine ( email )

423 Guardian Drive
Philadelphia, PA 19104
United States

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