Essays on child development in Indonesia

Abstract

Child development is fundamental in determining child health and in the long run contributes to human capital accumulation. However, exposure to adverse experiences during pregnancy or early life can have a detrimental impact on human capital accumulation later in life. Despite growing global evidence of the serious consequences of adverse childhood experiences on human capital accumulation, there is a significant gap in understanding how adversity in early life and childhood specifically affects child health and adult human capital, particularly in the context of Indonesia.

This dissertation aims to address this research gap by providing evidence on the impacts of three types of adverse childhood circumstances in Indonesia: malaria infection, tsunami exposure, and incomplete basic immunisation uptake. In Chapter 2, I investigate the long-term impacts of childhood malaria infection on education, health, and labour market outcomes in later life. Using my own household survey in two high malaria endemic districts in eastern Indonesia, Jayapura and Ambon municipalities, I employed an Instrumental Variable (IV) design, using the timing and intensity variations in malaria eradication program implementation across regions as the instrumental variable. The study finds that childhood malaria infection leads to fewer years of schooling, a lower probability of completing junior and secondary schooling, lower cognitive function, depressive symptoms, and a lower probability of employment in adulthood. In Chapter 3, I examine the long-term effects of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami on education and health outcomes in Banda Aceh, Indonesia. Employing a spatial regression discontinuity design and my survey data, I find that severely affected children have fewer years of schooling, reduced likelihood of pursuing higher education, and shorter average height compared to those mildly affected. Moreover, children aged 6-12 during the tsunami, heavily affected, show a higher prevalence of asthma and underweight in later years. In Chapter 4, I study the long-term effects of basic vaccination on educational and health outcomes, using the Indonesia Family Life Survey (IFLS) data. Leveraging information about the national Village Midwife Program in the 1990s, I aim to explore the impact of childhood vaccination on human capital development. To establish causal relationships, I use an IV approach exploiting the differential timing of village midwife presence in a community during the implementation of the program, interacting it with the squared inverse-distance from one's district of birthplace to the national capital as the instrumental variable. I find that children with complete routine vaccination tend to have more years of schooling, are likely to be taller, and have a lower risk of being underweight. I also find that less prevalence of stunting in childhood and better performance in cognitive tests could be possible underlying channels through which childhood vaccination might affect long-term educational and health outcomes. Show more