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Author: Rosales-Rueda, Maria Fernanda
Resulting in 3 citations.
1. Duncan, Greg J.
Lee, Kenneth T. H.
Rosales-Rueda, Maria Fernanda
Kalil, Ariel
Maternal Age and Child Development
Demography 55,6 (December 2018): 2229-2255.
Also: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13524-018-0730-3
Cohort(s): Children of the NLSY79, NLSY79
Publisher: Population Association of America
Keyword(s): Age at First Birth; Behavior Problems Index (BPI); Child Development; Educational Attainment; Mothers, Education; Peabody Individual Achievement Test (PIAT- Math); Peabody Individual Achievement Test (PIAT- Reading); Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT)

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

Although the consequences of teen births for both mothers and children have been studied for decades, few studies have taken a broader look at the potential payoffs--and drawbacks--of being born to older mothers. A broader examination is important given the growing gap in maternal ages at birth for children born to mothers with low and high socioeconomic status. Drawing data from the Children of the NLSY79, our examination of this topic distinguishes between the value for children of being born to a mother who delayed her first birth and the value of the additional years between her first birth and the birth of the child whose achievements and behaviors at ages 10–13 are under study. We find that each year the mother delays a first birth is associated with a 0.02 to 0.04 standard deviation increase in school achievement and a similar-sized reduction in behavior problems. Coefficients are generally as large for additional years between the first and given birth. Results are fairly robust to the inclusion of cousin and sibling fixed effects, which attempt to address some omitted variable concerns. Our mediational analyses show that the primary pathway by which delaying first births benefits children is by enabling mothers to complete more years of schooling.
Bibliography Citation
Duncan, Greg J., Kenneth T. H. Lee, Maria Fernanda Rosales-Rueda and Ariel Kalil. "Maternal Age and Child Development." Demography 55,6 (December 2018): 2229-2255.
2. Rosales-Rueda, Maria Fernanda
Family Investment Responses to Childhood Health Conditions: Intrafamily Allocation of Resources
Journal of Health Economics 37 (September 2014): 41-57.
Also: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167629614000691
Cohort(s): Children of the NLSY79, NLSY79
Publisher: Elsevier
Keyword(s): Birth Order; Birthweight; Child Health, Limiting Condition(s); Children, Mental Health; Family Resources; Family Structure; Home Observation for Measurement of Environment (HOME); Mothers, Education; Parental Investments; Pre-natal Care/Exposure; Self-Esteem; Siblings

The onset of a health condition during childhood impairs skill formation. A number of studies have investigated the long-lasting effects of poor health during childhood on later-in-life outcomes. However, this evidence ignores how parents respond to the onset of health conditions. Do their investments reinforce the health condition? Or compensate, or behave neutrally? If parents change their investments, the relationship between early health and later outcomes combines the biological effect and the investment responses. To address this question, I use within-sibling variation in the incidence of health conditions to control for selection from unobserved household heterogeneity. Parents invest, on average, 0.16 standard deviations less in children with mental conditions relative to their healthy siblings, using a measure of investment that includes time and resources. On the contrary, when children have a physical condition, parental investments do not differ across siblings. Results are robust to alternative measures of health conditions and the inclusion of child fixed effects.
Bibliography Citation
Rosales-Rueda, Maria Fernanda. "Family Investment Responses to Childhood Health Conditions: Intrafamily Allocation of Resources." Journal of Health Economics 37 (September 2014): 41-57.
3. Rosales-Rueda, Maria Fernanda
Three Essays on Families, Children and Human Capital Formation
Ph.D. Dissertation, Department of Public Policy Studies, The University of Chicago, 2014
Cohort(s): Children of the NLSY79, NLSY79
Publisher: ProQuest Dissertations & Theses (PQDT)
Keyword(s): Birth Order; Birthweight; Child Health, Limiting Condition(s); Children, Mental Health; Family Resources; Family Structure; Home Observation for Measurement of Environment (HOME); Modeling, Fixed Effects; Mothers, Behavior; Parental Investments; Pre-natal Care/Exposure; Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (RSES) (see Self-Esteem); Rotter Scale (see Locus of Control); Self-Esteem; Siblings

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

My dissertation investigates the interactions between family investments, early-life shocks and human capital among children. Understanding the role of the family has important implications for the design of social interventions that attempt to remediate adverse early childhood environments.

In the second essay, I consider how U.S. families choose to invest in response to the onset of a health condition in a child. Family investments can reinforce, or compensate for the occurrence of a health-limiting condition. The results from this paper shed light on the importance of incorporating the family unit as part of public policies that involve children with serious health conditions.

Bibliography Citation
Rosales-Rueda, Maria Fernanda. Three Essays on Families, Children and Human Capital Formation. Ph.D. Dissertation, Department of Public Policy Studies, The University of Chicago, 2014.