American Economic Review Vol. 107 No. 5 2017
Mothers Care More, But Fathers Decide: Educating Parents about Child Health in Uganda
Abstract
Research on intrahousehold decision-making generally finds that fathers have more bargaining power than mothers, but mothers put more weight on children's well-being. This suggests a tradeoff when targeting policies to improve child health: fathers have more power to change household behavior in ways that improve child health, but mothers might have a stronger desire to do so. This paper compares health classes in Uganda that enrolled either mothers or fathers. We find that educating mothers leads to greater adoption of health-promoting behaviors by the household. In addition, educating one parent leads to positive spillovers on the other spouse's health behaviors.
- DOI
- 10.1257/aer.p20171103
- Volume
- 107
- Issue
- 5
- Pages
- 496-500
- Language
- en
- Sources
- openalex crossref