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健康经济学workshop:Investing in the Womb: Identifying Gender Discrimination through the Lens of Prenatal Ultrasounds
发布日期：2017-05-29 10:25 来源：北京大学国家发展研究院
Title: Investing in the Womb: Identifying Gender Discrimination through the Lens of Prenatal Ultrasounds
Time: May 29th, 2017 (Monday) 10:00am -12:00am
Location: Zhifuxuan Conference Room, National School of Development, Peking U.
Speaker: Xi Chen, assistant professor of Global Health Policy and Economics at Yale University
Abstract
In utero is a critical period of human development during which parents act on children’s behalf in health investments. These investments may have a profound impact on the life trajectory of a child. We investigate whether parents in China who choose to carry the pregnancy to term allocate resources differently between their sons and daughters over the course of pregnancy after the sex of the child is disclosed to parents. Using unique and large-scale hospital electronic records of prenatal ultrasound scans and birth outcomes as well as a longitudinal survey of parents’ health behavior during pregnancy, we estimate how parental health behaviors and prenatal health investments change after parents gain access to gender information from post-20 gestational week ultrasound scans. In addition to the state-of-the-art difference-in-differences model, we employ a novel fetus fixed effect model to identify shifts in prenatal investments when information on child gender is disclosed. We document sex-selective prenatal investments as an early channel through which parents practice discriminatory behavior. We show that parents favorably shift certain parental health investments when pregnant with a boy. Specifically, the chance of exposure to passive smoking decreases while more mothers take nutrient supplements when parents expect boys compared to girls after receiving a post-20th gestational week ultrasound scan. A set of key placebo tests using pre-pregnancy and early pregnancy behaviors reassure us that our identified effects are likely causal. Our findings have implications for eliminating gender discrimination and improving maternal and child health in the earliest stage of life. These findings also call for utilizing the window of opportunity during pregnancy to more effectively promote smoking cessation.
Bio
Xi Chen, Ph.D., is an assistant professor of Global Health Policy and Economics at Yale University. He is a faculty fellow at the Yale Institution for Social and Policy Studies (ISPS), the Yale Climate Change and Health Initiative, the Yale Macmillan Center for International and Area Studies, the Yale Institute for Network Science (YINS), and a faculty advisor of the Yale-China Association. Chen is also President-Elect of the China Health Policy and Management Society (2016-18) and its President (2018-20), a research fellow at IZA and the Global Labor Organization (GLO), and a visiting professor at Nanjing University. He has been consulting for the United Nations. Chen's work has appeared in 20 peer-reviewed SSCI/SCI journals, recognized through numerous awards (including the Outstanding Dissertation Award of the AAEA, NIH Early Career Award), frequently interviewed by popular media worldwide (such as the Economist, The Washington Post, the New York Times, Time Magazine, Times of London, CCTV). Chen obtained a Ph.D. in Applied Economics from Cornell University.
Chen’s research focuses on early life health; 2) population aging and pension policies; 3) climate change and health; and 4) quality of life. Recently, Chen has been working on six main projects in the context of China: First, Chen leads two U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) grants to investigate how social pensions promote health and healthy aging; Second, Chen collaborates with researchers from Peking University to better understand the long lasting impact of air pollution on happiness, mental health, cognitive functioning, productivity, and the economy; Third, Chen works with Yale PEPPER Center and Yale Program on Aging to link the two ends of life course to better understand how early childhood circumstances determine health disparities in old age; Fourth, Chen works with Zhejiang University to evaluate a major medical payment reform in China that affects 1 billion population; Fifth, Chen works with the Environmental Health Science Division at Yale on a novel transdisciplinary project, the CHALLENGE (China Longitudinal Environmental, Genetic, and Economic Cohort), that studies 30,000 children aged 0-6 years old who were recruited at conception; Sixth, Chen involves in a longitudinal household survey in rural China with a unique social network data collection sponsored by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) to better understand social networks and health behaviors.
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健康经济学workshop:Investing in the Womb: Identifying Gender Discrimination through the Lens of Prenatal Ultrasounds
发布日期：2017-05-29 10:25 来源：北京大学国家发展研究院
Title: Investing in the Womb: Identifying Gender Discrimination through the Lens of Prenatal Ultrasounds
Time: May 29th, 2017 (Monday) 10:00am -12:00am
Location: Zhifuxuan Conference Room, National School of Development, Peking U.
Speaker: Xi Chen, assistant professor of Global Health Policy and Economics at Yale University
Abstract
In utero is a critical period of human development during which parents act on children’s behalf in health investments. These investments may have a profound impact on the life trajectory of a child. We investigate whether parents in China who choose to carry the pregnancy to term allocate resources differently between their sons and daughters over the course of pregnancy after the sex of the child is disclosed to parents. Using unique and large-scale hospital electronic records of prenatal ultrasound scans and birth outcomes as well as a longitudinal survey of parents’ health behavior during pregnancy, we estimate how parental health behaviors and prenatal health investments change after parents gain access to gender information from post-20 gestational week ultrasound scans. In addition to the state-of-the-art difference-in-differences model, we employ a novel fetus fixed effect model to identify shifts in prenatal investments when information on child gender is disclosed. We document sex-selective prenatal investments as an early channel through which parents practice discriminatory behavior. We show that parents favorably shift certain parental health investments when pregnant with a boy. Specifically, the chance of exposure to passive smoking decreases while more mothers take nutrient supplements when parents expect boys compared to girls after receiving a post-20th gestational week ultrasound scan. A set of key placebo tests using pre-pregnancy and early pregnancy behaviors reassure us that our identified effects are likely causal. Our findings have implications for eliminating gender discrimination and improving maternal and child health in the earliest stage of life. These findings also call for utilizing the window of opportunity during pregnancy to more effectively promote smoking cessation.
Bio
Xi Chen, Ph.D., is an assistant professor of Global Health Policy and Economics at Yale University. He is a faculty fellow at the Yale Institution for Social and Policy Studies (ISPS), the Yale Climate Change and Health Initiative, the Yale Macmillan Center for International and Area Studies, the Yale Institute for Network Science (YINS), and a faculty advisor of the Yale-China Association. Chen is also President-Elect of the China Health Policy and Management Society (2016-18) and its President (2018-20), a research fellow at IZA and the Global Labor Organization (GLO), and a visiting professor at Nanjing University. He has been consulting for the United Nations. Chen's work has appeared in 20 peer-reviewed SSCI/SCI journals, recognized through numerous awards (including the Outstanding Dissertation Award of the AAEA, NIH Early Career Award), frequently interviewed by popular media worldwide (such as the Economist, The Washington Post, the New York Times, Time Magazine, Times of London, CCTV). Chen obtained a Ph.D. in Applied Economics from Cornell University.
Chen’s research focuses on early life health; 2) population aging and pension policies; 3) climate change and health; and 4) quality of life. Recently, Chen has been working on six main projects in the context of China: First, Chen leads two U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) grants to investigate how social pensions promote health and healthy aging; Second, Chen collaborates with researchers from Peking University to better understand the long lasting impact of air pollution on happiness, mental health, cognitive functioning, productivity, and the economy; Third, Chen works with Yale PEPPER Center and Yale Program on Aging to link the two ends of life course to better understand how early childhood circumstances determine health disparities in old age; Fourth, Chen works with Zhejiang University to evaluate a major medical payment reform in China that affects 1 billion population; Fifth, Chen works with the Environmental Health Science Division at Yale on a novel transdisciplinary project, the CHALLENGE (China Longitudinal Environmental, Genetic, and Economic Cohort), that studies 30,000 children aged 0-6 years old who were recruited at conception; Sixth, Chen involves in a longitudinal household survey in rural China with a unique social network data collection sponsored by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) to better understand social networks and health behaviors.
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