(Translated by https://www.hiragana.jp/)
Is being an only child harmful to psychological health?: Evidence from an instrumental variable analysis of China's One-Child Policy
IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/arx/papers/2005.09130.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Is being an only child harmful to psychological health?: Evidence from an instrumental variable analysis of China's One-Child Policy

Author

Listed:
  • Shuxi Zeng
  • Fan Li
  • Peng Ding

Abstract

This paper evaluates the effects of being an only child in a family on psychological health, leveraging data on the One-Child Policy in China. We use an instrumental variable approach to address the potential unmeasured confounding between the fertility decision and psychological health, where the instrumental variable is an index on the intensity of the implementation of the One-Child Policy. We establish an analytical link between the local instrumental variable approach and principal stratification to accommodate the continuous instrumental variable. Within the principal stratification framework, we postulate a Bayesian hierarchical model to infer various causal estimands of policy interest while adjusting for the clustering data structure. We apply the method to the data from the China Family Panel Studies and find small but statistically significant negative effects of being an only child on self-reported psychological health for some subpopulations. Our analysis reveals treatment effect heterogeneity with respect to both observed and unobserved characteristics. In particular, urban males suffer the most from being only children, and the negative effect has larger magnitude if the families were more resistant to the One-Child Policy. We also conduct sensitivity analysis to assess the key instrumental variable assumption.

Suggested Citation

  • Shuxi Zeng & Fan Li & Peng Ding, 2020. "Is being an only child harmful to psychological health?: Evidence from an instrumental variable analysis of China's One-Child Policy," Papers 2005.09130, arXiv.org, revised Jun 2020.
    • Handle: RePEc:arx:papers:2005.09130
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://arxiv.org/pdf/2005.09130
    File Function: Latest version
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Constantine E. Frangakis & Donald B. Rubin, 2002. "Principal Stratification in Causal Inference," Biometrics, The International Biometric Society, vol. 58(1), pages 21-29, March.
    2. Sandra E. Black & Paul J. Devereux & Kjell G. Salvanes, 2005. "The More the Merrier? The Effect of Family Size and Birth Order on Children's Education," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 120(2), pages 669-700.
    3. Gary S. Becker & H. Gregg Lewis, 1974. "Interaction between Quantity and Quality of Children," NBER Chapters, in: Economics of the Family: Marriage, Children, and Human Capital, pages 81-90, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Hanushek, Eric A. & Rivkin, Steven G. & Jamison, Dean T., 1992. "Improving educational outcomes while controlling costs," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(1), pages 205-238, December.
    5. Pedro Carneiro & James J. Heckman & Edward J. Vytlacil, 2011. "Estimating Marginal Returns to Education," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(6), pages 2754-2781, October.
    6. Chuan Ju & Zhi Geng, 2010. "Criteria for surrogate end points based on causal distributions," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series B, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 72(1), pages 129-142, January.
    7. Stuart G. Baker, 2011. "Estimation and Inference for the Causal Effect of Receiving Treatment on a Multinomial Outcome: An Alternative Approach," Biometrics, The International Biometric Society, vol. 67(1), pages 319-323, March.
    8. Patrick Kline & Christopher R. Walters, 2019. "On Heckits, LATE, and Numerical Equivalence," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 87(2), pages 677-696, March.
    9. Heckman, James J, 1978. "Dummy Endogenous Variables in a Simultaneous Equation System," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 46(4), pages 931-959, July.
    10. Joshua Angrist & Victor Lavy & Analia Schlosser, 2010. "Multiple Experiments for the Causal Link between the Quantity and Quality of Children," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 28(4), pages 773-824, October.
    11. Wei Huang & Xiaoyan Lei & Yaohui Zhao, 2016. "One-Child Policy and the Rise of Man-Made Twins," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 98(3), pages 467-476, July.
    12. Arleen Leibowitz, 1974. "Home Investments in Children," NBER Chapters, in: Economics of the Family: Marriage, Children, and Human Capital, pages 432-456, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Nancy Qian, 2009. "Quantity-Quality and the One Child Policy:The Only-Child Disadvantage in School Enrollment in Rural China," NBER Working Papers 14973, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Edward Vytlacil & James J. Heckman, 2001. "Policy-Relevant Treatment Effects," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 91(2), pages 107-111, May.
    15. Laura Forastiere & Fabrizia Mealli & Tyler J. VanderWeele, 2016. "Identification and Estimation of Causal Mechanisms in Clustered Encouragement Designs: Disentangling Bed Nets Using Bayesian Principal Stratification," Journal of the American Statistical Association, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 111(514), pages 510-525, April.
    16. Xuran Wang & Yang Jiang & Nancy R. Zhang & Dylan S. Small, 2018. "Sensitivity analysis and power for instrumental variable studies," Biometrics, The International Biometric Society, vol. 74(4), pages 1150-1160, December.
    17. Small, Dylan S., 2007. "Sensitivity Analysis for Instrumental Variables Regression With Overidentifying Restrictions," Journal of the American Statistical Association, American Statistical Association, vol. 102, pages 1049-1058, September.
    18. Jin, Hui & Rubin, Donald B., 2008. "Principal Stratification for Causal Inference With Extended Partial Compliance," Journal of the American Statistical Association, American Statistical Association, vol. 103, pages 101-111, March.
    19. Arleen Leibowitz, 1974. "Home Investments in Children," NBER Chapters, in: Marriage, Family, Human Capital, and Fertility, pages 111-135, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    20. Bartolucci, Francesco & Grilli, Leonardo, 2011. "Modeling Partial Compliance Through Copulas in a Principal Stratification Framework," Journal of the American Statistical Association, American Statistical Association, vol. 106(494), pages 469-479.
    21. Leibowitz, Arleen, 1974. "Home Investments in Children," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 82(2), pages 111-131, Part II, .
    22. Daniel McFadden & Kenneth Train, 2000. "Mixed MNL models for discrete response," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 15(5), pages 447-470.
    23. Magne Mogstad & Matthew Wiswall, 2016. "Testing the quantity–quality model of fertility: Estimation using unrestricted family size models," Quantitative Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 7(1), pages 157-192, March.
    24. Edward Vytlacil, 2002. "Independence, Monotonicity, and Latent Index Models: An Equivalence Result," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 70(1), pages 331-341, January.
    25. Alfonso Miranda & Sophia Rabe-Hesketh, 2006. "Maximum likelihood estimation of endogenous switching and sample selection models for binary, ordinal, and count variables," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 6(3), pages 285-308, September.
    26. Jing Cheng, 2009. "Estimation and Inference for the Causal Effect of Receiving Treatment on a Multinomial Outcome," Biometrics, The International Biometric Society, vol. 65(1), pages 96-103, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Xinxin Mu & Shenghu Chen, 2022. "Family-Size Effect on Intergenerational Income Mobility under China’s Family Planning Policy: Testing the Quantity–Quality Trade-Off," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(19), pages 1-13, October.
    2. Hayward, Mathew & Cheng, Zhiming & Wang, Haining & Smyth, Russell, 2023. "Parental influence and the propensity for entrepreneurship: Evidence from the one-child policy," Journal of Business Venturing Insights, Elsevier, vol. 20(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Shuxi Zeng & Fan Li & Peng Ding, 2020. "Is being an only child harmful to psychological health?: evidence from an instrumental variable analysis of China's one‐child policy," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 183(4), pages 1615-1635, October.
    2. Baez, Javier E., 2008. "Does More Mean Better? Sibling Sex Composition and the Link between Family Size and Children’s Quality," IZA Discussion Papers 3472, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    3. Peng, Fei & Anwar, Sajid & Kang, Lili, 2022. "Number of siblings, access to treated water and returns to education in China," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 74(C), pages 526-538.
    4. Mont, Daniel & Nguyen, Cuong, 2013. "Does Parental Disability Matter to Child Education? Evidence from Vietnam," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 88-107.
    5. Oliveira, Jaqueline, 2016. "The value of children: Inter-generational support, fertility, and human capital," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 120(C), pages 1-16.
    6. Christian N. Brinch & Magne Mogstad & Matthew Wiswall, 2017. "Beyond LATE with a Discrete Instrument," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 125(4), pages 985-1039.
    7. Damian Clarke, 2018. "Children And Their Parents: A Review Of Fertility And Causality," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 32(2), pages 518-540, April.
    8. Xiong, Feng & Zang, Leizhen & Zhou, Ling & Liu, Fei, 2020. "The effect of number of siblings and birth order on educational attainment: Empirical Evidence from Chinese General Social Survey," International Journal of Educational Development, Elsevier, vol. 78(C).
    9. Joshua Angrist & Victor Lavy & Analia Schlosser, 2010. "Multiple Experiments for the Causal Link between the Quantity and Quality of Children," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 28(4), pages 773-824, October.
    10. Monfardini, Chiara & See, Sarah Grace, 2012. "Birth Order and Child Outcomes: Does Maternal Quality Time Matter?," IZA Discussion Papers 6825, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    11. Marx, Philip, 2024. "Sharp bounds in the latent index selection model," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 238(2).
    12. Daniel Mont & Cuong Viet Nguyen & Anh Tran, 2020. "The Effect of Sibship Size on Children’s Outcomes: Evidence from Vietnam," Child Indicators Research, Springer;The International Society of Child Indicators (ISCI), vol. 13(1), pages 147-173, February.
    13. de la Croix, David & Gosseries, Axel, 2012. "The natalist bias of pollution control," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 63(2), pages 271-287.
    14. Ea Hoppe Blaabæk & Mads Meier Jæger & Joseph Molitoris, 2020. "Family Size and Educational Attainment: Cousins, Contexts, and Compensation," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 36(3), pages 575-600, July.
    15. James J. Heckman, 2015. "Introduction to A Theory of the Allocation of Time by Gary Becker," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 0(583), pages 403-409, March.
    16. Michele Giannola, 2024. "Parental Investments and Intra-household Inequality in Child Human Capital: Evidence from a Survey Experiment," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 134(658), pages 671-727.
    17. Muriel Meunier & Augustin de Coulon & Oscar Marcenaro-Gutierrez & Anna Vignoles, 2013. "A longitudinal analysis of UK second-generation disadvantaged immigrants," Education Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 21(2), pages 105-134, March.
    18. Deborah A. Cobb-Clark & Nicolás Salamanca & Anna Zhu, 2019. "Parenting style as an investment in human development," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 32(4), pages 1315-1352, October.
    19. Azam Mehtabul & Hang Saing Chan, 2018. "Is There Really a Trade-Off? Family Size and Investment in Child Quality in India," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 18(1), pages 1-12, January.
    20. Aysit Tansel, 1998. "Determinants of School Attainment of Boys and Girls in Turkey," Working Papers 789, Economic Growth Center, Yale University.

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:arx:papers:2005.09130. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: arXiv administrators (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://arxiv.org/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.