Journal articles
Quintana-Domeque C, Zeng J (In Press). COVID-19 and mental health:
natural experiments of the costs of lockdowns. Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Economics and Finance
Oreffice S, Quintana-Domeque C (In Press). Gender inequality in COVID-19 times: Evidence from UK Prolific participants. Journal of Demographic Economics
Giuntella O, La Mattina G, Quintana-Domeque C (2023). Intergenerational Transmission of Health at Birth: Fathers Matter Too!. Journal of Human Capital, 17(2), 284-313.
Quintana-Domeque C, Zeng J, Zhang X (2022). Internet and mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic: evidence from the UK. Oxford Open Economics, 2
Quintana-Domeque C, Proto E (2022). On the Persistence of Mental Health Deterioration during the COVID-19 Pandemic by Sex and Ethnicity in the UK: Evidence from Understanding Society.
The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy,
22(2), 361-372.
Abstract:
On the Persistence of Mental Health Deterioration during the COVID-19 Pandemic by Sex and Ethnicity in the UK: Evidence from Understanding Society
Abstract
. We use longitudinal data from a representative sample of the UK and compare self-reported mental health, as measured by the GHQ-12 score, at three timepoints (2017–2019, April 2020 and March 2021), for the whole sample and by sex and ethnicity. Out of the 14,382 individuals interviewed in 2017–2019 and April 2020, 10,445 were interviewed again in March 2021. The mean GHQ-12 in April 2020 is 12.37 [95% CI: 12.22, 12.52] and in March 2021 is 12.36 [95% CI: 12.21, 12.51], above that of 2017–2019: 11.13 [95% CI: 10.99, 11.26]. We do not find evidence that the level of mental health goes back to pre-pandemic levels. In terms of inequalities, while the gender gap (mean difference between women and men) in mental health deterioration among White British is closing, there is no clear evidence that the ethnic gap (mean difference between ethnic minorities and White British) among men is changing.
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de Oliveira VH, Lee I, Quintana-Domeque C (2022). The effect of increasing Women's autonomy on primary and repeated caesarean sections in Brazil.
Health Econ,
31(8), 1800-1804.
Abstract:
The effect of increasing Women's autonomy on primary and repeated caesarean sections in Brazil.
Caesarean section (C-section) rates continue to rise globally. Yet, there is little consensus about the key determinants of rising C-section rates and the sources of variation in C-section rates across the world. While C-sections can save lives when medically justified, unnecessary surgical procedures can be harmful for women and babies. We show that a state-wide law passed in São Paulo (Brazil), which increased women's autonomy to choose to deliver via C-section even when not medically necessary, is associated with a 3% increase in overall C-section rates. This association was driven by a 5% increase in primary C-sections, rather than repeated C-sections. Since the law emphasizes women's autonomy, these results are consistent with mothers' demand being an important contributor to high C-section rates in this context.
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Quintana-Domeque C, Lee I, Zhang A, Proto E, Battisti M, Ho A (2021). Anxiety and depression among medical doctors in Catalonia, Italy, and the UK during the COVID-19 pandemic.
PLOS ONE,
16(11), e0259213-e0259213.
Abstract:
Anxiety and depression among medical doctors in Catalonia, Italy, and the UK during the COVID-19 pandemic
Healthcare workers have had the longest and most direct exposure to COVID-19 and consequently may suffer from poor mental health. We conducted one of the first repeated multi-country analysis of the mental wellbeing of medical doctors (n = 5,275) at two timepoints during the COVID-19 pandemic (June 2020 and November/December 2020) to understand the prevalence of anxiety and depression, as well as associated risk factors. Rates of anxiety and depression were highest in Italy (24.6% and 20.1%, June 2020), second highest in Catalonia (15.9% and 17.4%, June 2020), and lowest in the UK (11.7% and 13.7%, June 2020). Across all countries, higher risk of anxiety and depression symptoms were found among women, individuals below 60 years old, those feeling vulnerable/exposed at work, and those reporting normal/below-normal health. We did not find systematic differences in mental health measures between the two rounds of data collection, hence we cannot discard that the mental health repercussions of the pandemic are persistent.
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Oreffice S, Quintana-Domeque C (2021). COVID-19 Information, Demand and Willingness to Pay for Protective Gear in the UK.
Studies in Microeconomics,
9(2), 180-195.
Abstract:
COVID-19 Information, Demand and Willingness to Pay for Protective Gear in the UK
in the first month of the UK first lockdown, we studied the demand and willingness to pay (WTP) for hand sanitizer gel, disposable face masks and disposable gloves, and how information on tested people and coronavirus deaths explains the demand and WTP for these products. The specific hypotheses to test and concrete questions to study were pre-registered in AsPredicted (#38962) on 10 April 2020, and an online survey was launched in Prolific on a sample of the UK general population representative by age, sex and ethnicity on 11 April 2020. We find that there is a demand for these products, estimate the average WTP for them, and show that the provision of information affected the demand (and WTP) for disposable face masks. Providing information on the numbers of coronavirus cumulative tested people and coronavirus cumulative deaths increases the stated demand for disposable face masks by about 8 percentage points [95% CI: 0.8, 15.1] and 11 percentage points [95% CI: 3.7, 18.2], respectively. JEL Classifications: C99, D12, I12, I18
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Proto E, Quintana-Domeque C (2021). COVID-19 and mental health deterioration by ethnicity and gender in the UK.
PLOS ONE,
16(1), e0244419-e0244419.
Abstract:
COVID-19 and mental health deterioration by ethnicity and gender in the UK
We use the UK Household Longitudinal Study and compare pre-COVID-19 pandemic (2017-2019) and during-COVID-19 pandemic data (April 2020) for the same group of individuals to assess and quantify changes in mental health as measured by changes in the GHQ-12 (General Health Questionnaire), among ethnic groups in the UK. We confirm the previously documented average deterioration in mental health for the whole sample of individuals interviewed before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, we find that the average increase in mental distress varies by ethnicity and gender. Both women –regardless of their ethnicity– and Black, Asian, and minority ethnic (BAME) men experienced a higher average increase in mental distress than White British men, so that the gender gap in mental health increases only among White British individuals. These ethnic-gender specific changes in mental health persist after controlling for demographic and socioeconomic characteristics. Finally, we find some evidence that, among men, Bangladeshi, Indian and Pakistani individuals have experienced the highest average increase in mental distress with respect to White British men.
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de Oliveira VH, Lee I, Quintana-Domeque C (2021). Natural Disasters and Early Human Development: Hurricane Catarina and Infant Health in Brazil. Journal of Human Resources, 0816-8144R1.
Clarke D, Oreffice S, Quintana‐Domeque C (2021). On the Value of Birth Weight.
Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics,
83(5), 1130-1159.
Abstract:
On the Value of Birth Weight*
AbstractA large body of evidence documents the educational and labour market returns to birth weight, which are reflected in investments in large social safety net programmes targeting birth weight and early life health. However, there is no direct evidence on the private valuation of birth weight. In this paper, we estimate the willingness to pay for birth weight in the United States, using a series of discrete choice experiments. Within the normal birth weight range (2,500–4,000 g), we find that individuals are, on average, willing to pay $1.47 (95% CI: [$1.24, $1.70]) for each additional gram of birth weight when the value of birth weight is estimated linearly, or $2.40 (95% CI: [$2.03, $2.77]) when the value of birth weight is estimated non‐parametrically.
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Barban N, De Cao E, Oreffice S, Quintana-Domeque C (2021). The effect of education on spousal education: a genetic approach.
Labour Economics,
71Abstract:
The effect of education on spousal education: a genetic approach
We investigate the causal effect of education on spousal education using a sample of couples from the Health and Retirement Study. We estimate reduced-form linear matching functions derived from a parsimonious matching model which links spouses’ education. Using OLS we find that an additional year in husband's (resp. wife's) education is associated with an average increase in wife's (resp. husband's) education of 0.41 years —95% CI: 0.37, 0.45 (resp. 0.63 years —95% CI: 0.57, 0.68). To deal with endogeneity issues due to measurement error and omitted variables, we use a measure of genetic propensity (polygenic score) for educational attainment as an instrumental variable. Assuming that our instrument is valid, our 2SLS estimate suggests that an additional year in husband's (resp. wife's) education increases wife's (resp. husband's) education by about 0.49 years —95% CI: 0.35, 0.62 (resp. 0.76 —95% CI: 0.56, 0.96). Since greater genetic propensity for educational attainment has been linked to a range of personality and cognitive skills, we allow for the possibility that the exclusion restriction is violated using the plausible exogenous approach by Conley et al. (2012). A positive causal effect of education on spousal education cannot be ruled out, as long as one standard deviation increase in husband's (wife's) genetic propensity for education directly increases wife's (husband's) education by less than 0.2 (0.3) years.
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Chiappori PA, Oreffice S, Quintana-Domeque C (2020). Erratum: Fatter attraction: Anthropometric and socioeconomic matching on the marriage market.
Journal of Political Economy,
128(12), 4673-4675.
Abstract:
Erratum: Fatter attraction: Anthropometric and socioeconomic matching on the marriage market
Alfred Galichon pointed out to us an error in our paper “Fatter Attraction: Anthropometric and Socioeconomic Matching on the Marriage Market” (Chiappori, Oreffice, and Quintana-Domeque 2012). The properties derived in the theory section (sec. III) are not sufficient to validate the empirical strategy developed in the following section; the latter requires more specific assumptions. The issue can easily be described in the TU (transferable-utility) case (sec. III.B).We use the same notation as in the initial paper. In particular, women (men) are characterized by a vector ðX, εÞ RL RK (ðY , hÞ RK RL), where X (Y) is a vector of observable female (male) characteristics and ε (h) is a random vector reflecting female (male) unobservable attributes. Proposition 2 actually implies that, for any stable matching, the conditional distribution of the female index I(X), given the male characteristics Y, depends only on the male index J(Y ), and conversely. This property can be used to empirically estimate these indexes even in the most general framework, a possibility explored in forthcoming work.
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Quintana-Domeque C, Oreffice S, Clarke D (2019). The Demand for Season of Birth. Journal of Applied Econometrics
Chiappori P-A, Oreffice S, Quintana-Domeque C (2018). BIDIMENSIONAL MATCHING WITH HETEROGENEOUS PREFERENCES: EDUCATION AND SMOKING IN THE MARRIAGE MARKET.
JOURNAL OF THE EUROPEAN ECONOMIC ASSOCIATION,
16(1), 161-198.
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Quintana-Domeque C (2018). Introduction to the special issue in honor of Nobel Laureate Angus Deaton: "consumption, poverty and inequality in the household".
REVIEW OF ECONOMICS OF THE HOUSEHOLD,
16(1), 1-3.
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Hafeez N, Quintana-Domeque C (2018). Son Preference and Gender-Biased Breastfeeding in Pakistan.
ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT AND CULTURAL CHANGE,
66(2), 179-215.
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Quintana-Domeque C, Carvalho JR, de Oliveira VH (2018). Zika virus incidence, preventive and reproductive behaviors: Correlates from new survey data.
Econ Hum Biol,
30, 14-23.
Abstract:
Zika virus incidence, preventive and reproductive behaviors: Correlates from new survey data.
During the outbreak of the Zika virus, Brazilian health authorities recommended that pregnant women take meticulous precaution to avoid mosquito bites and that women in general use contraceptive methods to postpone/delay pregnancies. In this article, we present new estimates on the Zika virus incidence, its correlates and preventive behaviors in the Northeast of Brazil, where the outbreak initiated, using survey data collected between March 30th and June 3rd of 2016. The target population were women aged 15-49 in the capital cities of the nine states of the Northeast region of Brazil. We find that more educated women were less likely to report suffering from Zika (or its symptoms) and more likely to report having taken precaution against Zika, such as having used long and light-colored clothes, having used mosquito repellent or insecticides, having used mosquito protective screens or kept windows closed, and having dumped standing water where mosquitoes can breed. In addition, more educated women were more likely to report being informed about the association between Zika and microcephaly and to avoid pregnancy in the last 12 months. Finally, we also find that women who reported experiencing sexual domestic violence in the last 12 months were more likely to report suffering from Zika.
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Quintana-Domeque C, Rodenas-Serrano P (2017). The hidden costs of terrorism: the effects on health at birth.
JOURNAL OF HEALTH ECONOMICS,
56, 47-60.
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Quintana-Domeque C, Wohlfart J (2016). "Relative concerns for consumption at the top": an intertemporal analysis for the UK.
JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC BEHAVIOR & ORGANIZATION,
129, 172-194.
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Chiappori P-A, Oreffice S, Quintana-Domeque C (2016). BLACK-WHITE MARITAL MATCHING: RACE, ANTHROPOMETRICS, AND SOCIOECONOMICS.
JOURNAL OF DEMOGRAPHIC ECONOMICS,
82(4), 399-421.
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Oreffice S, Quintana-Domeque C (2016). Beauty, body size and wages: Evidence from a unique data set.
Econ Hum Biol,
22, 24-34.
Abstract:
Beauty, body size and wages: Evidence from a unique data set.
We analyze how attractiveness rated at the start of the interview in the German General Social Survey is related to weight, height, and body mass index (BMI), separately by gender and accounting for interviewers' characteristics or fixed effects. We show that height, weight, and BMI all strongly contribute to male and female attractiveness when attractiveness is rated by opposite-sex interviewers, and that anthropometric characteristics are irrelevant to male interviewers when assessing male attractiveness. We also estimate whether, controlling for beauty, body size measures are related to hourly wages. We find that anthropometric attributes play a significant role in wage regressions in addition to attractiveness, showing that body size cannot be dismissed as a simple component of beauty. Our findings are robust to controlling for health status and accounting for selection into working.
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Gonzalez-Navarro M, Quintana-Domeque C (2016). PAVING STREETS FOR THE POOR: EXPERIMENTAL ANALYSIS OF INFRASTRUCTURE EFFECTS.
REVIEW OF ECONOMICS AND STATISTICS,
98(2), 254-267.
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Quintana-Domeque C, Turino F (2016). Relative Concerns on Visible Consumption: a Source of Economic Distortions.
B E JOURNAL OF THEORETICAL ECONOMICS,
16(1), 33-45.
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Quintana-Domeque C (2015). Many congratulations to Professor Angus Deaton.
ECONOMICS & HUMAN BIOLOGY,
19, A1-A1.
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de Oliveira VH, Quintana-Domeque C (2014). Early-life environment and adult stature in Brazil: an analysis for cohorts born between 1950 and 1980.
ECONOMICS & HUMAN BIOLOGY,
15, 67-80.
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Bozzoli C, Quintana-Domeque C (2014). THE WEIGHT OF THE CRISIS: EVIDENCE FROM NEWBORNS IN ARGENTINA.
REVIEW OF ECONOMICS AND STATISTICS,
96(3), 550-562.
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Mondria J, Quintana-Domeque C (2013). Financial Contagion and Attention Allocation.
ECONOMIC JOURNAL,
123(568), 429-454.
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Oreffice S, Quintana-Domeque C (2012). Fat spouses and hours of work: are body and Pareto weights correlated?.
IZA Journal of Labor Economics,
1(1).
Abstract:
Fat spouses and hours of work: are body and Pareto weights correlated?
Abstract: We explore the relationship between relative physical attractiveness in the household and the hours worked by married men and women. Using PSID data, we find that husbands who are thinner relative to their wives work fewer hours, while wives who are heavier relative to their husbands work more hours. These results are robust to controlling for individual, spousal characteristics, and conventional distribution factors, suggesting that high body weight leads to low Pareto weight in the household: fatter spouses may compensate with more hours of work. Our household bargaining interpretation is supported by the fact that we cannot statistically reject the collective proportionality restriction when including measures of the distribution of relative physical attractiveness in the population. JEL codes: D1, J1, J22
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Chiappori P-A, Oreffice S, Quintana-Domeque C (2012). Fatter Attraction: Anthropometric and Socioeconomic Matching on the Marriage Market.
JOURNAL OF POLITICAL ECONOMY,
120(4), 659-695.
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Quintana-Domeque C, Bozzoli C, Bosch M (2012). The evolution of adult height across Spanish regions, 1950-1980: a new source of data.
ECONOMICS & HUMAN BIOLOGY,
10(3), 264-275.
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Quintana-Domeque C, Bozzoli C, Bosch M (2011). Infant mortality and adult stature in Spain.
SOCIAL SCIENCE & MEDICINE,
72(11), 1893-1903.
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Quintana-Domeque C (2011). Preferences, Comparative Advantage, and Compensating Wage Differentials for Job Routinization.
OXFORD BULLETIN OF ECONOMICS AND STATISTICS,
73(2), 207-229.
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Oreffice S, Quintana-Domeque C (2010). Anthropometry and socioeconomics among couples: evidence in the United States.
Econ Hum Biol,
8(3), 373-384.
Abstract:
Anthropometry and socioeconomics among couples: evidence in the United States.
We analyze the marriage-market aspects of weight and height in the United States using data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics on anthropometric characteristics of both spouses. We find evidence of positive sorting in spouses' body mass index (BMI), weight, and height. Within couples, gender-asymmetric trade-offs arise not only between physical and socioeconomic attributes, but also between anthropometric attributes, with significant penalties for fatter women and shorter men. A wife's obesity (BMI or weight) measures are negatively correlated with her husband's income, education, and height, controlling for his weight and her height, along with spouses' demographic and socioeconomic characteristics. Conversely, heavier husbands are not penalized by matching with poorer or less educated wives, but only with shorter ones. Height is valued mainly for men, with shorter men matched with heavier and less educated wives.
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Bozzoli C, Deaton A, Quintana-Domeque C (2009). ADULT HEIGHT AND CHILDHOOD DISEASE.
DEMOGRAPHY,
46(4), 647-669.
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Garcia Villar J, Quintana-Domeque C (2009). Income and body mass index in Europe.
ECONOMICS & HUMAN BIOLOGY,
7(1), 73-83.
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Gonzalez-Navarro M, Quintana-Domeque C (2009). The reliability of self-reported home values in a developing country context.
JOURNAL OF HOUSING ECONOMICS,
18(4), 311-324.
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Garcia J, Quintana-Domeque C (2007). Obesity, employment and wages in Europe.
Adv Health Econ Health Serv Res,
17, 187-217.
Abstract:
Obesity, employment and wages in Europe.
This paper examines the associations between obesity, employment status and wages for several European countries. Our results provide weak evidence that obese workers are more likely to be unemployed or tend to be more segregated in self-employment jobs than their non-obese counterparts. We also find difficult to detect statistically significant relationships between obesity and wages. As previously reported in the literature, the associations between obesity, unemployment and wages seem to be different for men and women. Moreover, heterogeneity is also found across countries. Such heterogeneity can be somewhat explained by some labor market institutions, such as collective bargaining coverage and employer-provided health insurance.
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Garcia J, Quintana-Domeque C (2007). The evolution of adult height in Europe: a brief note.
ECONOMICS & HUMAN BIOLOGY,
5(2), 340-349.
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