When left-behind children become adults and parents: The long-term human capital consequences of parental absence in China

This study examines the long-term effects of childhood left-behind experience on human capital outcomes across two generations in China. Using data from the China Family Panel Studies (CFPS), we find evidence that adults with left-behind experience in early life have fewer schooling years, lower cognitive test scores, a lower Big Five personality traits index, but a higher internal locus of control. Meanwhile, they are more likely to report underweight, chronic diseases, depression, and lower levels of perceived health and happiness. Our findings of the negative consequences on personality traits and health outcomes are robust to a battery of specification and validity tests. These effects also differ markedly by adults' gender, birth cohort, hukou status, and the characteristics of left-behind experience (i.e., type, timing, and duration). Further, our results also suggest a potential intergenerational transmission mechanism in which human capital loss is induced by one's early-life exposure to parental absence. Specifically, one's childhood left-behind experience is also inversely associated with their offspring's outcomes such as Big Five noncognitive skills, birth weight, and height-for-age z-score. Although adults with left-behind experience are inclined to spend more time with offspring compared with their non-left-behind counterparts, they also tend to have significantly poorer household socioeconomic outcomes and less offspring educational investment.