TV, female empowerment and demographic transition in rural India Presented at LIDC Seminar on Replication, 6/6/2012 Vegard Iversen, University of Manchester & Richard Palmer-Jones, University of East Anglia This work has largely been funded by the International Initiative for Impact Evaluation (3ie)
• Jensen, R., & Oster, E. (2009). The Power of TV: Cable Television and Women’s Status in India *. Quarterly Journal of Economics , 124 (3), 1057-1094 – Top ranked economics journal • Impact Factor: 5.940 5-Yr impact factor: 8.05 • Cited by 77 (Google Scholar, Jan, 2012) – “the introduction of cable television is associated with • significant decreases in the reported acceptability of domestic violence toward women • [significant] decreases in son preference , … • increases in women’s autonomy and • decreases in fertility. • increases school enrollment for younger children, • perhaps through increased participation of women in household decision making .”
• JO find rapid pro-social improvements in the same year that cable TV arrives in a village • JO suggest, cable TV portrays urban lifestyles – Women are more empowered • New role models • Affecting attitudes towards and liberties of women in the home and workplace – Cite results of effects of (mainly pro-social) programming in Brazil • But - patriarchal attitudes and norms are typically understood to be rigid and deeply entrenched in village India. – Longer term trends such as such as juvenile sex-ratio continue to deteriorate
Continuing female disadvantage e.g. juvenile sex ratios 980 960 940 920 900 1961 1971 1981 1991 2001 2011 Census year population child (0-6) TV has spread very widely, and become main source of media even in rural India Hence, JO conclusion very surprising
• Also – what’s worrying about this figure?
• Survey of Aging in Rural India (SARI): – three year panel data (household and individual), 2001, 2002 and 2003 • 2700 households with woman over 50; low attrition (108 – 4%) – five states (Bihar, Haryana, Delhi, Goa and Tamil Nadu) • 180 randomly sampled villages • Women only interviewed n=3053 (*3 -> 9,159) – Survey instruments explicitly modelled on female autonomy and attitude modules in NFHS II (1998-99). – Own survey of cable operators in Tamil Nadu • District Information System on Education (DISE) (administrative) monitoring data for – all villages in 19 randomly chosen Blocks from 5 Districts of Tamil Nadu (with low cable penetration in 1998). – Own survey of date of arrival of cable TV in selected blocks 1 .
Analysis X s c ivt vt iv t ivt ivt is the measure of cable access in village , year ; c v t vt is outcome for individual in village in year s i v t; ivt individual fixed effects, are year dummies, and X are other controls iv t ivt • SARI – Tabular and graphic descriptives – Panel analysis (xtreg) • Individual responses to village level treatment • DISE – Time series (prais - Prais-Winston estimation) • Village level enrolment rates – Graphic of enrolment (total) by year by year of cable access
Replication • Replication data & code provided by authors – SARI • final estimation data & analysis code – DISE • Raw data, data preparation & analysis code • Checking – Published results reproduced exactly with data and code tables using SARI and DISE data – DISE data preparation coded contains minor coding error • Has significant effect
Authors’ data J&O data Figure 7: Enrolment of cohort 6-7 year in 2002 by year and access to cable Figure 7: Enrolment of cohort 6-7 year in 2002 by year and access to cable 10000 10000 10000 5200 5000 5000 5000 8000 8000 8000 enrolment enrolment 4000 4000 • 5 year olds added to 6-10 aggregate but not 6- enrolment enrolment 4800 6000 6000 6000 3000 3000 4600 4000 4000 4000 2000 4400 2000 14 aggregate in 2005-7 cohorts 2000 2000 2000 4200 1000 1000 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 year year year year year year got cable 2002 never got cable got cable 2003 never got cable got cable 2004 never got cable got cable 2002 never got cable got cable 2003 never got cable got cable 2004 never got cable – Has significant effect on Figure 7 (see next slide) 5000 5000 10000 10000 10000 5000 8000 8000 8000 4000 4000 enrolment enrolment enrolment enrolment 4000 • DISE analysis of little value 6000 6000 6000 3000 3000 3000 4000 4000 4000 2000 2000 2000 2000 2000 – Mistake reduces estimated effect 2000 1000 1000 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 year year year year year year got cable 2005 never got cable got cable 2006 never got cable got cable 2007 never got cable got cable 2005 never got cable got cable 2006 never got cable got cable 2007 never got cable – Lack of covariates which could account for Jensen & Oster DISE variables VI & RPJ DISE variables Shows rising Shows falling endogenous CABLE placement enrolment in enrolment in villages with villages with and without and without access to cable access to cable TV! TV
SARI main empirical specification • Units – women respondents • Treatment variable is Village has cable • Controls – INTERACTED WITH YEAR – Village control - population density, electricity and distance to nearest town – Individual controls • Baseline - education • Annual - income per capita, age (quadratic), – Year dummies • Identification – 90 already had cable in 2002 – 21 get cable in 2002 & 3 – 69 never had in this period – All villages in Delhi already had cable TV in 2002 5, 4, 6 & 6 added in Bihar, Goa, Haryana, and TN) • Errors clustered at village level
• is actually a multi-level model Cable present in year t year t Outcomes for female i in village Individual in year y fixed effects Year * state dummies controls for individual i of village v in year t , including the log of controls for village v set in household income per capita (the the year 2001, including household in which the respondent the log of population resides) and her age and age density, the log of squared. Age does not appear distance to nearest large separately, but age-squared does town, and whether the village is electrified controls for individual i in village v which are (which does not change fixed for the base year of the panel period over the panel period); (2001), including years of education and sex, and do not vary over the panel period;
JO’s main results strongly significant negative coefficients on “village has cable” Low r-square Effects survive when testing for future access to cable Critique Odd outcome variable construction Missing controls including TV watching, ethnicity, migration - others
Outcome variables (y ivy ) • Index of attitudes to wife beating – – acceptable if: “wife cheats on him”, “family does enough dowry”, “shows disrespect”, “goes out without permission”, “neglects children”, “cooks badly” • Index of women’s empowerment/autonomy: – women decides: • “on expenditure on own health care”, “purchase of major items”, “visit friends”, “spend her own money” , – needs permission to • “go to market”, “visit friends” • Son preference (next child) • Fertility – Currently pregnant – Pregnant over time
Outcome variables • Outcomes are “ Borda ” indexes from several questions – Some component questions not significantly related to outcomes – Approval index driven by jewellery question • Jewellery question driven by TN and lacks external validity – Autonomy index has duplication of “visit” dimension • Respecify outcome indexes to exclude questionable questions – Use scaling methods – pca or mca
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