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Title: Dynamic Effects of Sibling Death on Children’s Outcomes
Resulting in 1 citation.
1. Fletcher, Jason
Vidal-Fernández, Marian
Wolfe, Barbara L.
Dynamic Effects of Sibling Death on Children’s Outcomes
Working Paper, University of New South Wales, Centre for Applied Economic Research, January 2013.
Cohort(s): Children of the NLSY79, NLSY79, NLSY79 Young Adult
Publisher: University of New South Wales
Keyword(s): Adolescent Behavior; Age at First Birth; Alcohol Use; Armed Forces Qualifications Test (AFQT); Behavior Problems Index (BPI); Home Observation for Measurement of Environment (HOME); Mortality; Peabody Individual Achievement Test (PIAT- Math); Peabody Individual Achievement Test (PIAT- Reading); Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT); Self-Perception Profile for Children (SPPC); Trauma/Death in family

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

This paper explores the effects of experiencing the death of a sibling on children’s outcomes. Recent work has shown that experiencing a sibling death is common and the long-term effects are large. We extend our understanding by estimating the dynamic effects on cognitive, non- cognitive and home environmental measures as the surviving children age using the Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 (NLSY79). We first examine the family level predictors of experiencing the death of a child. Because families who experience a death may differ from other families, we compare the trajectories of children before and after experiencing a sibling death only among families who experience a death. We find large initial effects on cognitive and non-cognitive outcomes that decline over time and also provide evidence that the effects are larger if the surviving child is older, suggesting sensitive periods of exposure. Auxiliary results suggest that parental inputs decline following the death but also that, for some families, children’s outcomes rebound following the death of a sibling who had significant disabilities.
Bibliography Citation
Fletcher, Jason, Marian Vidal-Fernández and Barbara L. Wolfe. "Dynamic Effects of Sibling Death on Children’s Outcomes." Working Paper, University of New South Wales, Centre for Applied Economic Research, January 2013..