The Consequences of Migration for Child Well-being in Sending Areas

描述（由申请人提供）：不断增长的国内和国际移民影响了发展中国家越来越多的儿童。大多数留守儿童是由于父母一方或双方去别处找工作。移民是父母缺席的一种独特形式，可能以复杂的方式影响这些儿童，由于父母缺席而产生相当大的社会成本，但通过汇款带来经济效益。然而，越来越多的文献并没有在单一框架内研究移民的这些多重影响及其中介机制。拟议的项目将审查两个发展中环境中父母外迁对儿童福利的影响。利用来自墨西哥和印度尼西亚的高质量纵向数据集，具有极好的可比性和丰富的微观和宏观信息（墨西哥家庭生活调查和印度尼西亚家庭生活调查），并在PI以前工作中制定的概念框架的基础上，本项目力求：(1)研究移民对墨西哥和印度尼西亚留守儿童福祉的关键方面（教育状况、认知发展和健康）的有利和不利影响；(2)探索各种社会经济、社会心理和行为因素如何介导移民对儿童福祉的影响；(3)评估两种移民流（国内移民和跨国移民）结果的普遍性；(4)检验两种研究设置结果的普遍性。纵向数据分析方法（固定效应和随机效应模型）将用于加强因果关系的主张。这项研究将是对发展中国家移民留守儿童的首次全面研究。它概述并测试了一个复杂的概念框架，考察了外出移民对一系列广泛的儿童结果的有益和破坏性影响。研究结果将有助于就移民是否以及如何影响发展中社会的儿童福祉展开辩论。比较分析的结果将导致一个更充分的框架，能够更好和更广泛地解释儿童向外移徙的后果。在本研究中开发和完善的概念框架和分析方法都可以适用于其他环境，并有助于为未来的工作提供信息。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Rising internal and international migration has affected a growing number of children in developing countries. Most of these children are left behind as one or both parents leave to seek work elsewhere. Migration represents a distinct form of parental absence, and is likely to affect these children in complex ways, generating sizeable social costs as a result of parental absence, but bringing economic benefits through remittances. However, the growing body of literature has not examined these multiple influences of migration and their mediating mechanisms within a single framework. The proposed project will examine the effects of parental out-migration on child well-being in two developing settings. Using high-quality longitudinal datasets from Mexico and Indonesia with excellent comparability and rich micro- and macro-level information (the Mexican Family Life Survey and the Indonesia Family Life Survey), and building on a conceptual framework developed in the PI's previous work, this project seeks to: (1) examine both the beneficial and detrimental impacts of migration on key aspects of well-being (educational status, cognitive development, and health) of children left behind in Mexico and Indonesia; (2) explore how various socioeconomic, psychosocial, and behavioral factors mediate the effects of migration on child well-being; (3) assess the generalizability of results across two streams of migration (within-country and cross-country out- migration); and (4) examine the generalizability of results across the two research settings. Longitudinal data analysis methods (fixed- and random-effect modeling) will be used to strengthen causal claims. This research will be the first comprehensive study of children left behind by migrants in developing settings. It outlines and tests a complex conceptual framework, examining both beneficial and disruptive effects of out- migration on a wide array of child outcomes. Findings will contribute to the debate on whether and how migration shapes child well-being in developing societies. Results from the comparative analysis will lead to a more adequate framework that can better and more broadly interpret the consequences of out-migration for children. Both the conceptual framework and the analytic approach developed and refined in this research can be adapted in other settings and help inform future work. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: This research will provide comprehensive and robust information on the effects of out-migration on children's health, education, and cognitive development. Such information can inform the design of intervention programs by local governments and global development organizations such as USAID and UNICEF, to reinforce the benefits while mitigating the costs of out-migration for children's health and well-being. 1