In patriarchal societies, sticky norms affect married women's social circles, their autonomy, and the outcomes of intra-household bargaining. This paper uses primary data on women's social networks in Uttarakhand, India; the modal woman has only three friends, and over 80 percent do not have any...

This paper investigates whether social structure helps or hinders factor allocation using unusually rich data from The Gambia. Evidence indicates that land available for cultivation is allocated unequally across households; and that factor transfers are more common between neighbors, co-ethnics,...

A core insight from early behavioral economics is that much of human judgment and behavior is influenced by "fast thinking" that is intuitive, associative, and automatic; very little human thinking resembles the rational thinking that characterizes homo economicus. What is less well-recognized is...

This paper uses unique data collected in rural Pakistan to assess the extent to which consanguinity, which is widespread in North Africa, Central and West Asia, and most parts of South Asia, is linked to child cognitive ability and nutritional status. As economic benefits of marrying cousins may...

This paper examines the potential for bringing together cash transfer and parenting programs focused on child stimulation to boost child development, particularly for children ages 0-3 years. The paper reviews the rationale for linking both types of programs and the evidence to date on the...

This paper experimentally evaluates a large-scale and low-cost parenting program targeting poor families in Chile. Households in 162 public health centers were randomly assigned to three groups: a control group, a second group that was offered eight weekly group parenting sessions, and a third...

Household expenditures for children-related goods may change when one of the parent migrates and do so differently depending on whether it is the mother or the father that leaves. A sequential model that explains migration and budget allocation choices is proposed and its predictions are tested...

When social security is established to provide pensions to parents, their reliance upon children for future financial support decreases, and their need to save for retirement also falls. In this study, the expansion of pension coverage from the state sector to the non-state sector in urban China...

This paper examines the effect of parental disability on school enrollment and educational performance for children in the 2006 Vietnam Household Living Standards Survey. Results from instrumental-variables regressions indicate that children of parents with a disability have a lower enrollment...

Substantial work has demonstrated that early nutrition and home environments, including the degree to which children receive cognitive stimulation and emotional support from parents, play a profound role in influencing early childhood development. Yet, less work has documented the joint...