Determinants of Cognitive Development in Deprived Environments: Evidence from the West Bank

这一跨学科项目的总体目标是确定学校教育、营养不良、健康不良和创伤对西岸巴勒斯坦人口中儿童的认知发展和学习生产力的因果影响。我们的项目汇集了以色列、巴勒斯坦和德国的科学家，他们在认知心理学、公共卫生以及教育和卫生经济学方面拥有互补的专业知识。图1显示了我们用来推导假设的概念框架的图形表示，随后使用认知测试和访谈数据对这些假设进行了分析，这些数据是在该项目第一阶段从大约6 000名5至9年级的巴勒斯坦学生及其家庭和学校校长那里收集的。具体的研究问题将在工作计划部分详细说明。该项目的合作伙伴在国际和跨学科合作方面分享了广泛的经验。AQ营养和健康研究所所长Ziad Abdeen将提供研究西岸儿童和青少年营养不良、虐待、应激障碍和健康的专业知识。HU教育和心理测量副教授Sorel Cahan是教育和心理测量以及学校教育对认知发展的影响方面的专家，伍珀塔尔大学(UW)健康经济学和管理学教授Hendrik Jürges在教育和健康之间的因果联系方面进行了广泛的工作，并提供了使用最先进的计量经济学技术从观测数据中识别因果影响的专业知识。

The overarching objective of this interdisciplinary project is to identify the causal effects of schooling, malnutrition, bad health, and trauma on the cognitive development and learning productivity among children within the Palestinian population of the West Bank. Our project brings together Israeli, Palestinian and German scientists with complementary expertise in cognitive psychology, public health, and education and health economics. Fig. 1 shows a graphical representation of the conceptual framework we use to derive hypotheses that are subsequently analyzed using the cognitive test and interview data collected from approximately 6,000 Palestinian students in grades 5 to 9 and their families as well as school principals during the first phase of this project. Specific research questions will be explicated in the work program section. The partners in this project share wide experience in international and interdisciplinary collaboration. Ziad Abdeen, Director of the AQ Nutrition and Health Research Institute, will provide expertise in studying malnutrition, maltreatment, stress disorders and health among children and adolescents in the West Bank. Sorel Cahan, Associate Professor of Educational and Psychological Measurement at HU, is an expert in educational and psychological measurement and schooling effects on cognitive development Hendrik Jürges, Professor of Health Economics and Management at the University of Wuppertal (UW), has worked extensively on the causal link between education and health and provides expertise in the identification of causal effects from observational data using state-of-the-art econometric techniques.