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on Neuroeconomics |
| By: | Carolina Caetano; Gregorio S. Caetano; Débora Mazetto; Meghan Skira |
| Abstract: | This paper documents video consumption among school-aged children in the U.S. and explores its impact on human capital development. Video watching is common across all segments of society, yet surprisingly little is known about its developmental consequences. With a bunching identification strategy, we find that an additional hour of daily video consumption has a negative impact on children’s noncognitive skills, with harmful effects on both internalizing behaviors (e.g., depression) and externalizing behaviors (e.g., social difficulties). We find a positive effect on math skills, though the effect on an aggregate measure of cognitive skills is smaller and not statistically significant. These findings are robust and largely stable across most demographics and different ways of measuring skills and video watching. We find evidence that for Hispanic children, video watching has positive effects on both cognitive and noncognitive skills—potentially reflecting its role in supporting cultural assimilation. Interestingly, the marginal effects of video watching remain relatively stable regardless of how much time children spend on the activity, with similar incremental impacts observed among those who watch very little and those who watch for many hours. |
| JEL: | C24 D12 I20 J13 |
| Date: | 2025–11 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:34466 |
| By: | Connor, Dylan; Sheehan, Connor; Jang, Jiwon; Kemeny, Tom; Suss, Joel; Molina, Mercedes; Xie, Siqiao; Gu, Zhining; Saenz, Joseph |
| Abstract: | Using a new database on the net worth and self-reported cognitive impairment for almost two million adults, this paper provides the first large-scale evidence linking community wealth to age-related cognitive decline. This assessment is timely as widening geographic wealth gaps in the USA fuel disparities in access to public goods and amenities, positioning community wealth as a critical determinant of cognitive health. Conditioning on personal wealth and other risk factors, we find that a standard deviation increase in community wealth is associated with a 6.7% relative risk reduction in cognitive impairment across the national population of older adults, rising to 13.7% for those residing in the poorest fifth of communities. Community wealth matters more than relative inequality, and its associated protective effects are larger for non-white, non-college educated, and low net worth householders. This is plausibly because these individuals rely more on the public goods and services underwritten by local affluence. The economic fragmentation of American communities thus poses a growing threat to the cognitive health of Americans, especially among those from socially vulnerable and marginalized backgrounds |
| Date: | 2025–10–29 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:osf:socarx:fpcr5_v1 |