Child Support and Child Obesity in Colombia

Background and Purpose. Child support reduces income poverty among custodial-mother families in a wide range of countries. Less is known about the extent to which this monetary transfer has distinct effects on child well-being, especially in less developed countries. Child support may have a distinct influence on child well-being by increasing incentives to spend family income on children, influencing family dynamics in beneficial ways or simply avoiding the stigma associated with other non-labor income such as cash welfare. This study examines the role of child support on children’s obesity in Colombia. The prevalence of child obesity along with dramatic family changes and very little extant research on concomitant child support issues make Colombia an interesting case study for developing countries.

Methods. I use data from the Colombian Longitudinal Survey of Wealth, Income, Labor and Land (ELCA) for 499 children aged 0 to 5 in custodial-mother families in urban Colombia. I use probit models with extensive controls, propensity score matching (PSM) techniques, and fixed effects models to estimate the association between child support and obesity. Child support is measured with an indicator variable of whether the family was living in a household that received any amount of child support during the year before the survey. This amount includes both in-kind and cash support as well as formal (with a legal order) and informal (without a legal order) support. I calculate three different measures of obesity (overweight, obesity, and severe obesity) using weight-for-lenght z-scores and cut-off points that classify children in each different status as defined by the World Health Organization.

Results. Analyses using probit models and PSM techniques suggest that there is a statistically significant increase in obesity among children who received child support, net of other factors associated with obesity. Children who receive any child support in the year before anthropometric measures were taken are between 5 and 7 percentage points more likely to experience obesity at the time of the survey. This finding confirms other recent work and supports the “Disneyland dad” hypothesis, discussed in much previous research. Specifically, limited time with their children may lead noncustodial fathers to avoid conflict when they get together, making food choices that provide immediate enjoyment (e.g., ice cream, fast food, soda, etc.) and engaging in activities that do not encourage physical activity (e.g., playing video games, watching movies, etc.). The mechanisms through which child support may impact child obesity in the context of Colombia will be further investigated

Implications.  This finding could have implications for policies designed to promote child well-being in Colombia and other Latin American countries, especially those focused on improving nutritional outcomes such as conditional cash transfer programs; efforts to integrate child support systems to these interventions may help noncustodial fathers improve their influence on their children’s well-being.