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The effect of children on depression in old age

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  • Kruk, Kai Eberhard
  • Reinhold, Steffen

Abstract

This article investigates the causal relationship between the number of biological children and mental health of elderly Europeans. Specifically, we ask whether additional children improve or threaten parents' mental health status. The identification of causal effects draws on two natural experiments that exogenously increase the number of children: multiple births and the sex composition of the first two children. This setup allows us to identify the effect of expected and desired as well as the effect of unexpected additional children on mental health. For women, we find conflicting evidence regarding the effect of additional children on mental health, and we only find a negative effect of having additional children on mental health using multiple birth at the second pregnancy as instrument. Thus, it takes a rare and somewhat particular situation to uncover the negative effect. There is no evidence for a causal effect of additional children on the probability to suffer from depression for elder men.

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  • Kruk, Kai Eberhard & Reinhold, Steffen, 2014. "The effect of children on depression in old age," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 100(C), pages 1-11.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:100:y:2014:i:c:p:1-11
    DOI: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2013.09.003
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    2. Tabea Bucher-Koenen & Helmut Farbmacher & Raphael Guber & Johan Vikström, 2020. "Double Trouble: The Burden of Child-rearing and Working on Maternal Mortality," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 57(2), pages 559-576, April.
    3. Barbara Pertold-Gebicka & Dominika Spolcova, 2019. "Family Size and Subjective Well-being in Europe: Do More Children Make Us (Un)Happy?," Working Papers IES 2019/24, Charles University Prague, Faculty of Social Sciences, Institute of Economic Studies, revised Aug 2019.
    4. XIE Mingjia & YIN Ting & ZHANG Yi & OSHIO Takashi, 2022. "The Hidden Cost of Having More Children: The Impact of Fertility on the Elderly's Healthcare Utilization," Discussion papers 22033, Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI).
    5. Aassve, Arnstein & Luppi, Francesca & Pronzato, Chiara & Pudney, Steve, 2020. "Lifetime events and the well-being of older people," Department of Economics and Statistics Cognetti de Martiis. Working Papers 202001, University of Turin.
    6. Kolodziej, Ingo W.K. & García-Gómez, Pilar, 2017. "The causal effects of retirement on mental health: Looking beyond the mean effects," Ruhr Economic Papers 668, RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-University Bochum, TU Dortmund University, University of Duisburg-Essen.
    7. Rao, Ziwei & Zhang, Yi, 2024. "Rely on children or work longer? The impact of fertility and child gender on old-age labor supply," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 181(C).
    8. Beatrice Baaba Tawiah, 2023. "The Effect of Children on Health," Working Papers Dissertations 103, Paderborn University, Faculty of Business Administration and Economics.
    9. Hongyan Yang & Jun Ma & Hongwei Hu & Fanjie Li, 2020. "Identification, Trend Analysis and Influencing Factors of Mental Health Status of the Chinese Older Adults," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(21), pages 1-13, November.
    10. Rannveig Hart & Sara Cools, 2019. "Identifying interaction effects using random fertility shocks," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 40(10), pages 261-278.
    11. Hao-yu Hu & Wei Wang & Da-wei Feng & Hua-lei Yang & Zhong-kun Zhu, 2022. "Number of Children and Monetary Transfers to Elderly Parents in Rural China," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 159(2), pages 593-615, January.
    12. Thijs van den Broek & Marco Tosi, 2020. "The More the Merrier? The Causal Effect of High Fertility on Later-Life Loneliness in Eastern Europe," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 149(2), pages 733-748, June.
    13. Bonsang, Eric & Pronkina, Elizaveta, 2023. "Family size and vaccination among older individuals: The case of COVID-19 vaccine," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 50(C).

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