Seminar Vol. 185

Title: Parental Absence in Childhood and Adult Criminal Behaviour: Evidence from Survey and Experimental Data from Prison Inmates in China

Speaker: Xin Meng, Australian National University 

Venue: Conference Room 406, Zengxianzi Science Hall

About the speaker:

Professor Xin Meng currently works at the Research School of Economics at Australian National University. Her research covers many aspects of the Chinese labour market, including income inequality, poverty, internal migration, consumption, gender issue and the impact of the Great Famine and Cultural Revolution. Her works have appeared in many leading international journals, including Science, Review of Economic Studies, Economic Journal, Journal of Economic Perspectives, Journal of Labor Economics, Journal of Development Economics, Journal of Public Economics and Demography.

Abstract:

Large scale rural-to-urban migration has resulted in dramatic changes in Chinese family structure over the past three decades. The barriers to bringing the children of migrants to the cities resulting from China's household registration (hukou) system has resulted in an estimated 61 million children in China being left-behind in rural villages when their parents migrate to the cities. This lack of parental care and guidance has given rise to concern about potential social consequence. This paper uses unique survey and experimental data from male prison inmates and their comparable non-inmates to examine whether parental absence in childhood is associated with increased criminality in adulthood. We use control function and sibling fixed effects estimation to identify causal impacts. We find that parental absence in childhood increases the propensity of adult males to commit crimes. Our experimental data show that being left-behind increases risk-loving behaviours. Being left behind also results in reduced educational attainment. Both lower educational attainment and more risk-loving behaviour increase the propensity to commit crimes.