The long-term cognitive and schooling effects of childhood vaccinations in China

IF 5.2 1区经济学 Q1 ECONOMICS

中国经济评论 Pub Date : 2024-10-20 DOI:10.1016/j.chieco.2024.102293

Hamid R. Oskorouchi , Alfonso Sousa-Poza , David E. Bloom

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Abstract

By exploiting rich retrospective data from the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study on childhood immunization, socioeconomics, and health status, we assess the long-term effects of childhood vaccination on cognitive and educational outcomes in China. Applying an instrumental variable approach that resembles an unobserved natural experiment to different sets of control variables and subsamples, we estimate the average and local treatment effects of childhood vaccination. Our results confirm that immunization before the age of 15 has long-term positive and economically meaningful effects on non-health outcomes such as education and cognitive skills. These effects are strong, with vaccinated individuals enjoying about one additional year of schooling and performing better on several cognitive tests later in life. Finally, a causal mediation analysis shows that, although education mediates the effect of childhood immunization on later-life cognitive abilities, other factors (e.g., better child health) are more responsible for these long-term effects.

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中国儿童接种疫苗对认知和学校教育的长期影响

通过利用中国健康与退休纵向研究（China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study）中有关儿童免疫接种、社会经济和健康状况的丰富回顾性数据，我们评估了儿童接种疫苗对中国认知和教育结果的长期影响。通过对不同的控制变量和子样本进行类似于无观测自然实验的工具变量方法，我们估算了儿童疫苗接种的平均和局部治疗效果。我们的结果证实，15 岁前的免疫接种对教育和认知技能等非健康结果具有长期积极的、有经济意义的影响。这些效应非常明显，接种疫苗的人可多上一年学，并在日后的几项认知测试中表现更佳。最后，因果中介分析表明，尽管教育对儿童免疫接种对日后认知能力的影响起中介作用，但其他因素（如更好的儿童健康）对这些长期影响的作用更大。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

中国经济评论 ECONOMICS-

CiteScore

10.60

自引率

4.40%

发文量

380

期刊介绍： The China Economic Review publishes original works of scholarship which add to the knowledge of the economy of China and to economies as a discipline. We seek, in particular, papers dealing with policy, performance and institutional change. Empirical papers normally use a formal model, a data set, and standard statistical techniques. Submissions are subjected to double-blind peer review.