Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/51429 
Year of Publication: 
2008
Series/Report no.: 
Working Paper No. 633
Publisher: 
Inter-American Development Bank, Research Department, Washington, DC
Abstract: 
This paper focuses on fertility choices in Brazil, a country where soap operas (novelas) portray families that are much smaller than in reality, to study the effects of television on individual behavior. Using Census data for the period 1970-1991, the paper finds that women living in areas covered by the Globo signal have significantly lower fertility. The effect is strongest for women of lower socioeconomic status and for women in the central and late phases of their fertility cycle. Finally, the paper provides evidence that novelas, rather than television in general, affected individual choices.
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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