Millions of children are left behind when their parents migrate from home to another place. This study examines whether parental migration can affect health and cognitive ability of left-behind children aged at 5-8 years old in Ethiopia, India, Peru, and Vietnam. It uses data on 7725 children in the four countries collected from Young Lives surveys in 2007 and 2009. It finds that although parental migration helps families increase per capita consumption, it does not improve health and cognitive ability of children. The effect of parental migration varies across different countries and different types of migration. In Ethiopia, parental migration does not have a significant effect on children. However, parental migration reduces health outcomes of children in other three countries and decreases cognitive ability test scores in India and Vietnam. The negative effect on children tends to be higher for long-term parental migration than short-term parental migration. © 2016 Elsevier Ltd.

Vietnam India Child nutrition Peru Ethiopia parental migration Parental absence Child welfare

Child, Abandoned Parents Vietnam India physiology human statistics and numerical data abandoned child time factor comparative study Time Factors Surveys and Questionnaires Humans family psychology parent male preschool child cognition Viet Nam Child, Preschool female Child Welfare questionnaire child health Ethiopia nutrition major clinical study migration international migration cognitive function test Emigration and Immigration Peru parental care Child