The effects of nutrition support on behavioral outcomes and labor productivity

Abstract

While many of the world’s poor consume inadequate calories with low nutritional value, there has been little work on how this may shape their behaviors and productivity. Using lab-in-the-field and field experiments in the context of a floriculture plant in Ethiopia, this study investigates the effects of a nutrition support program on behavioral outcomes—stress, prosociality, cooperation, and attention—and productivity. We find that nutrition support relieves stress and decreases prosociality, exhibiting a pattern of hedonic adaptation over time. We do not find evidence for improvements in labor productivity.