Big Sisters
<h3>Abstract</h3> We model household investments in young children when parents and older siblings share caregiving responsibilities and investments by older siblings contribute to young children’s human capital accumulation. To test the predictions of our model, we estimate the impact of having an older sister (as opposed to an older brother) on early childhood development in a sample of rural Kenyan households with otherwise similar family structures. Having an older sister rather than an older brother improves younger siblings’ vocabulary and fine motor skills by more than 0.1 standard deviations.
Authors
- Owen Ozier (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6088-0888)
- Heather A. Knauer (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8617-8958)
- Lia C. H. Fernald (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1555-4607)
- Pamela Jakiela (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5056-650X)
Institutions
- Deakin University (AU)
- IZA - Institute of Labor Economics (DE)
- Ferring Pharmaceuticals (Switzerland) (CH)
- Heatherwood Hospital (GB)
- Williams & Associates (US)
- Hella (Germany) (DE)
- Owens Community College (US)
- Ottawa University (US)
- University of California, Berkeley (US)
Publication Details
- Journal
- The Journal of Human Resources
- Published
- 2025-08-08
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.3368/jhr.0623-12969r1
- Primary Topic
- Culture, Economy, and Development Studies
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 0.00
Funders
- World Bank Group