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Author: Goodman, Joshua
Resulting in 2 citations.
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Goodman, Joshua |
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The Wages of Sinistrality: Handedness, Brain Structure and Human Capital Accumulation HKS Faculty Research Working Paper Series RWP12-002, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, 2012. Also: http://dash.harvard.edu/handle/1/7779971 Cohort(s): Children of the NLSY79, NLSY79, NLSY79 Young Adult, NLSY97 Publisher: John F. Kennedy School of Government Keyword(s): Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB); Behavior Problems Index (BPI); British Cohort Study (BCS); Cognitive Ability; Digit Span (also see Memory for Digit Span - WISC); Earnings; Handedness; Human Capital; Intergenerational Patterns/Transmission; NCDS - National Child Development Study (British); Occupational Information Network (O*NET); Occupational Status; Peabody Individual Achievement Test (PIAT- Math); Peabody Individual Achievement Test (PIAT- Reading) Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher. Left- and right-handed individuals have different brain structures, particularly in relation to language processing. Using five data sets from the US and UK, I show that poor infant health increases the likelihood of a child being left-handed. I argue that handedness can thus be used to explore the long-run impacts of differential brain structure generated in part by poor infant health. Even conditional on infant health and family background, lefties exhibit economically and statistically significant human capital deficits relative to righties. Compared to righties, lefties score a tenth of a standard deviation lower on measures of cognitive skill and, contrary to popular wisdom, are not over-represented at the high end of the distribution. Lefties have more emotional and behavioral problems, have more learning disabilities such as dyslexia, complete less schooling, and work in less cognitively intensive occupations. Differences between left- and right-handed siblings are similar in magnitude. Most strikingly, lefties have six percent lower annual earnings than righties, a gap that can largely be explained by these differences in cognitive skill, disabilities, schooling and occupational choice. Lefties work in more manually intensive occupations than do righties, further suggesting that lefties’ primary labor market disadvantage is cognitive rather than physical. Those likely be left-handed due to genetics show smaller or no deficits relative to righties, suggesting the importance of environmental shocks as the source of disadvantage. Handedness provides parents and schools a costlessly observable characteristic with which to identify young children whose cognitive and behavioral development may warrant additional attention. |
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Bibliography Citation
Goodman, Joshua. "The Wages of Sinistrality: Handedness, Brain Structure and Human Capital Accumulation." HKS Faculty Research Working Paper Series RWP12-002, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, 2012. |
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Goodman, Joshua |
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The Wages of Sinistrality: Handedness, Brain Structure, and Human Capital Accumulation Journal of Economic Perspectives 28,4 (Fall 2014): 193-212. Also: http://www.jstor.org/stable/23973564?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents Cohort(s): Children of the NLSY79, NLSY79, NLSY79 Young Adult, NLSY97 Publisher: American Economic Association Keyword(s): Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB); Behavior Problems Index (BPI); British Cohort Study (BCS); Cognitive Ability; Digit Span (also see Memory for Digit Span - WISC); Earnings; Handedness; Human Capital; Intergenerational Patterns/Transmission; Peabody Individual Achievement Test (PIAT- Math); Peabody Individual Achievement Test (PIAT- Reading) Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher. Using five datasets from the United States and the United Kingdom, I show that, consistent with prior research, both maternal left-handedness and poor infant health increase the likelihood of a child being left-handed. |
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Bibliography Citation
Goodman, Joshua. "The Wages of Sinistrality: Handedness, Brain Structure, and Human Capital Accumulation." Journal of Economic Perspectives 28,4 (Fall 2014): 193-212.
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