IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/bri/cmpowp/08-198.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Handedness and Child Development

Author

Listed:
  • Paul Gregg
  • Katharina Janke
  • Carol Propper

Abstract

Left-handedness is historically associated with poorer outcomes for adults. Yet recent work has suggested that there may be positive labour market returns for left-handed males. This paper examines whether handedness is also associated with poorer outcomes for children and whether this differs by genders. The paper examines a wide set of outcomes for children as they age from 42 months to 14 years. We find the main penalty is not from being left-handed, but is from not having a dominant hand early in life. This penalty is larger for girls than boys by age 14, indicating that early deficits of non-right handed boys appear to fall as they age. For girls, being left-handed and especially mixed-handed at early ages is associated with persistent cognitive attainment deficits, mainly focused at the lower end of the ability distribution.

Suggested Citation

  • Paul Gregg & Katharina Janke & Carol Propper, 2008. "Handedness and Child Development," The Centre for Market and Public Organisation 08/198, The Centre for Market and Public Organisation, University of Bristol, UK.
    • Handle: RePEc:bri:cmpowp:08/198
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.bristol.ac.uk/cmpo/publications/papers/2008/wp198.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Christopher S. Ruebeck & Joseph E. Harrington, Jr & Robert Moffitt, 1997. "Handedness and Earnings," Economics Working Paper Archive 533, The Johns Hopkins University,Department of Economics, revised Jun 2004.
    2. Beck A. Taylor & Eric Dearing & Kathleen McCartney, 2004. "Incomes and Outcomes in Early Childhood," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 39(4).
    3. Jo Blanden & Paul Gregg & Lindsey Macmillan, 2007. "Accounting for Intergenerational Income Persistence: Noncognitive Skills, Ability and Education," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 117(519), pages 43-60, March.
    4. James J. Heckman & Jora Stixrud & Sergio Urzua, 2006. "The Effects of Cognitive and Noncognitive Abilities on Labor Market Outcomes and Social Behavior," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 24(3), pages 411-482, July.
    5. Johnston, David W. & Shah, Manisha & Shields, Michael A., 2007. "Handedness, Time Use and Early Childhood Development," IZA Discussion Papers 2752, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    6. John M. Barron & Mark C. Berger & Dan A. Black, 2006. "Selective Counteroffers," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 24(3), pages 385-410, July.
    7. Kevin Denny & Vincent O'Sullivan, 2004. "The economic consequences of being left-handed : some sinister results (version 2.0)," Working Papers 200422, School of Economics, University College Dublin.
    8. Jo Blanden & Paul Gregg & Lindsey Macmillan, 2006. "Explaining Intergenerational Income Persistence: Non-cognitive Skills, Ability and Education," The Centre for Market and Public Organisation 06/146, The Centre for Market and Public Organisation, University of Bristol, UK.
    9. Alison Aughinbaugh & Maury Gittleman, 2003. "Does Money Matter?: A Comparison of the Effect of Income on Child Development in the United States and Great Britain," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 38(2).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

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


    Cited by:

    1. Benerdeta Malusi & Luke Odiemo & Kimamo Githui, 2019. "Educational Inclusiveness: Addressing Society¡¯s Failure to Accommodate Left-Handedness," International Journal of Learning and Development, Macrothink Institute, vol. 9(4), pages 60-81, December.
    2. Paul Frijters & David Johnston & Manisha Shah & Michael Shields, 2013. "Intrahousehold Resource Allocation: Do Parents Reduce or Reinforce Child Ability Gaps?," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 50(6), pages 2187-2208, December.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Gregg, Paul & Propper, Carol & Washbrook, Elizabeth, 2007. "Understanding the relationship between parental income and multiple child outcomes: a decomposition analysis," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 6196, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    2. Almond, Douglas & Currie, Janet, 2011. "Human Capital Development before Age Five," Handbook of Labor Economics, in: O. Ashenfelter & D. Card (ed.), Handbook of Labor Economics, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 15, pages 1315-1486, Elsevier.
    3. Janet Currie, 2009. "Healthy, Wealthy, and Wise: Socioeconomic Status, Poor Health in Childhood, and Human Capital Development," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 47(1), pages 87-122, March.
    4. Janet Currie & Mark Stabile, 2007. "Mental Health in Childhood and Human Capital," NBER Chapters, in: The Problems of Disadvantaged Youth: An Economic Perspective, pages 115-148, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Salm, Martin & Schunk, Daniel, 2008. "The Role of Childhood Health for the Intergenerational Transmission of Human Capital: Evidence from Administrative Data," IZA Discussion Papers 3646, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    6. Frijters, Paul & Johnston, David W. & Shah, Manisha & Shields, Michael A., 2008. "Early Child Development and Maternal Labor Force Participation: Using Handedness as an Instrument," IZA Discussion Papers 3537, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    7. Emilia Del Bono & Marco Francesconi & Yvonne Kelly & Amanda Sacker, 2016. "Early Maternal Time Investment and Early Child Outcomes," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 126(596), pages 96-135, October.
    8. Pfeiffer, Friedhelm & Reuß, Karsten, 2008. "Age-dependent skill formation and returns to education," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 15(4), pages 631-646, August.
    9. David W. Johnston & Michael E. R. Nicholls & Manisha Shah & Michael A. Shields, 2013. "Handedness, health and cognitive development: evidence from children in the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 176(4), pages 841-860, October.
    10. Joshua Goodman, 2014. "The Wages of Sinistrality: Handedness, Brain Structure, and Human Capital Accumulation," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 28(4), pages 193-212, Fall.
    11. Fali Huang & Myoung‐jae Lee, 2009. "Does Television Viewing Affect Children'S Behaviour?," Pacific Economic Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 14(4), pages 474-501, October.
    12. Leandro Carvalho, 2012. "Childhood Circumstances and the Intergenerational Transmission of Socioeconomic Status," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 49(3), pages 913-938, August.
    13. Björn Bartling & Ernst Fehr & Daniel Schunk, 2012. "Health effects on children’s willingness to compete," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 15(1), pages 58-70, March.
    14. O'Connell, Michael & Sheikh, Hammad, 2008. "Achievement-related attitudes and the fate of "at-risk" groups in society," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 29(4), pages 508-521, August.
    15. repec:esx:essedp:756 is not listed on IDEAS
    16. repec:cep:sticas:/129 is not listed on IDEAS
    17. Frijters, Paul & Johnston, David W. & Shields, Michael A., 2011. "Destined for (Un)Happiness: Does Childhood Predict Adult Life Satisfaction?," IZA Discussion Papers 5819, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    18. Anna Christina D'Addio, 2007. "Intergenerational Transmission of Disadvantage: Mobility or Immobility Across Generations?," OECD Social, Employment and Migration Working Papers 52, OECD Publishing.
    19. Bonhomme, Stphane & Robin, Jean-Marc, 2009. "Consistent noisy independent component analysis," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 149(1), pages 12-25, April.
    20. Dinand Webbink & Sunčica Vujić & Pierre Koning & Nicholas G. Martin, 2012. "The Effect Of Childhood Conduct Disorder On Human Capital," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 21(8), pages 928-945, August.
    21. Heckman, James J. & Urzúa, Sergio, 2010. "Comparing IV with structural models: What simple IV can and cannot identify," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 156(1), pages 27-37, May.
    22. David Bravo Urrutia & Sergio Urzúa & Claudia Sanhueza, 2007. "Is There Labor Market Discrimination Among Professionals In Chile? Lawyers, Doctors And Business-People," Working Papers wp264, University of Chile, Department of Economics.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Handedness; child outcomes;

    JEL classification:

    • I12 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health Behavior
    • J13 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Fertility; Family Planning; Child Care; Children; Youth

    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:bri:cmpowp:08/198. 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.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with 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: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cmbriuk.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.