Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/146492 
Year of Publication: 
2016
Series/Report no.: 
IDB Working Paper Series No. IDB-WP-714
Publisher: 
Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), Washington, DC
Abstract: 
This study explores sex differences in language and socio-emotional skills. It focuses on children 7 months old to 6 years old in Chile in 2012 and Nicaragua in 2013. A focus on young children allowed for ruling out a set of environmental and identity effects to explain the gap. Females had an advantage in both countries and both dimensions. Males in Chile scored at -0.13 standard deviations (SD) in language in the distribution of females. In addition, males scored at -0.20 SD in socio-emotional skills. The gaps in Nicaragua were not statistically different to those in Chile. Thus geographical and cultural variation across the two countries did not affect the gap. Within countries, variation in family characteristics, parenting practices and health investments did not explain the gap either. These findings shed light on the role of biological and environmental factors to explain sex gaps. The identification of the role of these factors is necessary to inform policy.
Subjects: 
gender gaps
sex gaps
language
social skills
emotional skills
early childhood
JEL: 
I25
J13
J16
O15
Z13
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
Creative Commons License: 
cc-by-nc-nd Logo
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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