IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/aea/aecrev/v107y2017i5p541-45.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Excess Male Infant Mortality: The Gene-Institution Interactions

Author

Listed:
  • Roland Pongou
  • Barthelemy Kuate Defo
  • Zacharie Tsala Dimbuene

Abstract

Excess male mortality at early ages is an important source of child inequality in most societies. We examine how improvement in the quality of political institutions affects the male survival disadvantage. Using data on twins in combination with a natural experiment on the development of African institutions, we quantify the distinct effects of biology and preconception environment on the infant mortality sex gap and find that these effects are important only in poor institutions. The analysis implies that improved institutions constrain genetic expression and mitigate preconception influences on excess male infant mortality, which is an optimistic finding with pragmatic implications.

Suggested Citation

  • Roland Pongou & Barthelemy Kuate Defo & Zacharie Tsala Dimbuene, 2017. "Excess Male Infant Mortality: The Gene-Institution Interactions," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(5), pages 541-545, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:aea:aecrev:v:107:y:2017:i:5:p:541-45
    Note: DOI: 10.1257/aer.p20171146
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257/aer.p20171146
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.aeaweb.org/articles/attachments?retrieve=aM5WP8YeDammwwNmAV0V9gJ7ZwVDsKyx
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.aeaweb.org/articles/attachments?retrieve=7yRLtJucYK93U7xNNseX5K2gQofhPJL4
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.aeaweb.org/articles/attachments?retrieve=PAlsrQ7O0ujX5jxzRQo7NwcziS3dLOVO
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to AEA members and institutional subscribers.
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. PONGOU Roland & SHAPIRO David & TENIKUE Michel, 2018. "Missing Twins: Fetal Origins, Institutions, and Twin-singleton Mortality Convergence," LISER Working Paper Series 2018-04, Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER).
    2. Fenske, James & Wang, Shizhuo, 2023. "Tradition and mortality: Evidence from twin infanticide in Africa," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 163(C).
    3. Tan, Chih Ming & Tan, Zhibo & Zhang, Xiaobo, 2023. "The intergenerational legacy of the 1959–1961 Great Chinese Famine on children’s cognitive development," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 51(C).
    4. Wang, Linfeng & Shi, Tie & Chen, Hanyi, 2023. "Air pollution and infant mortality: Evidence from China," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 49(C).
    5. Roland Pongou, 2020. "Is Excess (Fe)Male Mortality Caused by the Prenatal Environment, Child Biology, or Parental Discrimination? New Evidence from Male-Female Twins," Working Papers 2008E Classification-I15,, University of Ottawa, Department of Economics.
    6. Ahsan, Md Nazmul & Thakur, Sounak, 2024. "The great Indian demonetization and gender gap in health outcomes: Evidence from two Indian states," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 53(C).
    7. Marie Christelle Mabeu & Roland Pongou, 2021. "The Interplay Between Colonial History and Postcolonial Institutions: Evidence from Cameroon," Working Papers 2111E Classification-D02,, University of Ottawa, Department of Economics.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D72 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
    • I12 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health Behavior
    • I14 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health and Inequality
    • I18 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Government Policy; Regulation; Public Health
    • J13 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Fertility; Family Planning; Child Care; Children; Youth
    • J16 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination
    • O15 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Economic Development: Human Resources; Human Development; Income Distribution; Migration

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:aea:aecrev:v:107:y:2017:i:5:p:541-45. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Michael P. Albert (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/aeaaaea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.