TY  - JOUR
AU  - Cawley,John
AU  - Liu,Feng
TI  - Mechanisms for the Association Between Maternal Employment and Child Cognitive Development
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 13609
PY  - 2007
Y2  - November 2007
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w13609
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w13609.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
John Cawley
3M24 MVR Hall
Department of Policy Analysis and Management
and Department of Economics
Cornell University
Ithaca, NY  14853
Tel: 607/255-0952
Fax: 607/255-4071
E-Mail: jhc38@cornell.edu

Feng Liu
Zhongshan University
E-Mail: cnliufeng@gmail.com
AB  - Recent research has found that maternal employment is associated with worse child performance on tests of cognitive ability.  This paper explores mechanisms for that correlation.  We estimate models of instrumental variables using a unique dataset, the American Time Use Survey, that measure the effect of maternal employment on the mother's allocation of time to activities related to child cognitive development.  We find that employed women spend significantly less time reading to their children, helping with homework, and in educational activities in general.  We find no evidence that these decreases in time are offset by increases in time by husbands and partners.  These findings offer plausible mechanisms for the association of maternal employment with child cognitive development.
ER  -