Communication Barriers and Infant Health: The Intergenerational Effect of Randomly Allocating Refugees across Language Regions

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Auer, Daniel; Kunz, Johannes S.
• 署名单位: Collegio Carlo Alberto; University of Mannheim; Monash University
• 刊物名称: AMERICAN ECONOMIC JOURNAL-ECONOMIC POLICY
• ISSN/ISSBN: 1945-7731
• DOI: 10.1257/pol.20230220
• 发表日期: 2025
• 页码: 71-106
• 关键词: intrauterine growth restriction; labor-market; child-mortality; asylum seekers; UNITED-STATES; birth-weight; transmission; education; IMPACT; integration

摘要

This paper investigates the intergenerational effect of communication barriers on child health at birth. We study refugees in Switzerland who come from French-or Italian-speaking countries and who, upon arrival, are randomly allocated to different cantons in which either German, French, or Italian is the dominant language. Children born to mothers who were exogenously allocated to a region whose dominant language matches their origin language are, on average, 72 grams (or 2.2 percent) heavier. Further analyses suggest that this effect is likely driven by information about health-related behavior and services. Coethnic networks, however, can partly compensate for communication barriers. (JEL I12, J13, J15, J16, Z13)