The Causal Effect of Maternal Education on Child Mortality: Evidence From a Quasi-Experiment in Malawi and Uganda.

ABSTRACT: Since the 1980s, the demographic literature has suggested that maternal schooling plays a key role in determining children's chances of survival in low- and middle-income countries; however, few studies have successfully identified a causal relationship between maternal education and under-5 mortality. To identify such a causal effect, we exploited exogenous variation in maternal education induced by schooling reforms introducing universal primary education in the second half of the 1990s in Malawi and Uganda. Using a two-stage residual inclusion approach and combining individual-level data from Demographic and Health Surveys with district-level data on the intensity of the reform, we tested whether increased maternal schooling reduced children's probability of dying before age 5. In Malaw

SUBMITTER: Andriano L 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6797651 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature