Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/145219 
Authors: 
Year of Publication: 
2016
Series/Report no.: 
IZA Discussion Papers No. 10085
Publisher: 
Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA), Bonn
Abstract: 
This paper provides evidence for informational spillovers within urban slums in Chandigarh, India. I identify three groups, a treatment group, a neighboring spillover group, and a non-adjacent pure control group. Mothers of children (aged 3-6 years) enrolled in government day-care centers are given recipe books in the treatment group to reduce malnutrition in their children. Spillovers to neighboring (untreated) mothers can be through social learning or imitation. Results from a difference-in-differences analysis show that nutritional knowledge measured through a quiz increases among neighboring untreated mothers relative to a control group. Neighboring mothers exhibit learning spillovers, changes in dietary behavior and a reduction in food expenditure regardless of their level of literacy. Spillovers not only raise the cost effectiveness of health information programs but are important to consider when designing an experiment as causal effects of treatments can be attenuated if the spillover group is used as a control group.
Subjects: 
spillovers
malnutrition
India
JEL: 
D62
D83
I15
I18
I38
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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