Windows of Opportunity in Early Childhood: A Dynamic Model of Multidimensional Development
NBER Working Papers · 2026 · Orazio Attanasio、Raquel Bernal、Michele Giannola、Milagros Nores
中文摘要
本文利用一项儿童早期教育项目评估期间收集的儿童发展数据，估计了一个刻画1至6岁期间人的发展的动态模型。我们对三个潜在因子——健康、认知技能和社会情感技能——进行建模，并允许这些因子彼此之间以及与多种投入相互作用，共同塑造后续发展。数据的丰富性和高频特征使我们能够采用灵活的模型设定：（i）允许复杂的动态过程；（ii）允许每个因子对其他因子的生产作出贡献；（iii）允许生产技术随年龄变化；（iv）将父母投资视为内生。我们利用估计得到的模型识别“机会窗口”，即父母干预或增加投资的项目尤为有效的时期。结果表明，发展动态比通常假设的更为丰富，这对理解影响的持续性具有重要启示：投入的影响可能衰减，也可能持续，其变化方式因发展领域和年龄而异。考虑投资内生性对推断有重要影响。
Abstract
Using child development data collected during the evaluation of an early childhood education program, this paper estimates a dynamic model of human development from ages 1 to 6. We model three latent factors—health, cognitive skills, and socio-emotional skills—and allow them to interact with each other and with multiple inputs to shape subsequent development. The richness and high-frequency nature of the data permit a flexible specification that (i) allows for complex dynamics, (ii) lets each factor con- tribute to the production of the others, (iii) permits age-varying production technologies, and (iv) treats parental investment as endogenous. We use the estimated model to identify “windows of opportunity” in which parental interventions, or programs that increase investment, are especially effective. Results indicate that developmental dynamics are richer than typically assumed, with important implications for persistence: the impact of inputs can decay or endure in ways that vary across domains and over age. Accounting for endogenous investment is consequential for inference.