Peer Gender Composition and Mental Health: Evidence from Administrative Data
(2020) In Working Papers- Abstract (Swedish)
- Adolescent mental health is key for later well-being. Yet, causal evidence on environmental drivers of adolescent mental health is scant. I study how an important classroom feature - gender composition in compulsory-school - affects mental health. I exploit Swedish register data (N = 576,285) to link variation in gender composition across classrooms within cohorts to mental health diagnoses. The results indicate that a higher share of female peers in one's class reduces mental health, particularly among boys. The effects persist after students' transition to a different high-school class. Peer composition can thus be an important and persistent driver of early mental health.
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
https://lup.lub.lu.se/record/33ed8306-b634-40e3-80c1-3b071d7095a8
- author
- Getik, Demid LU
- organization
- publishing date
- 2020-07-17
- type
- Working paper
- publication status
- published
- subject
- keywords
- Gender, Peer effects, Mental health, I19, I21, J16
- in
- Working Papers
- issue
- 2020:13
- pages
- 43 pages
- language
- English
- LU publication?
- yes
- id
- 33ed8306-b634-40e3-80c1-3b071d7095a8
- alternative location
- https://swopec.hhs.se/lunewp/abs/lunewp2020_013.htm
- date added to LUP
- 2020-09-02 10:54:32
- date last changed
- 2020-09-02 10:54:32
@misc{33ed8306-b634-40e3-80c1-3b071d7095a8, abstract = {Adolescent mental health is key for later well-being. Yet, causal evidence on environmental drivers of adolescent mental health is scant. I study how an important classroom feature - gender composition in compulsory-school - affects mental health. I exploit Swedish register data (N = 576,285) to link variation in gender composition across classrooms within cohorts to mental health diagnoses. The results indicate that a higher share of female peers in one's class reduces mental health, particularly among boys. The effects persist after students' transition to a different high-school class. Peer composition can thus be an important and persistent driver of early mental health.}, author = {Getik, Demid}, language = {eng}, month = {07}, note = {Working Paper}, number = {2020:13}, series = {Working Papers}, title = {Peer Gender Composition and Mental Health: Evidence from Administrative Data}, url = {https://swopec.hhs.se/lunewp/abs/lunewp2020_013.htm}, year = {2020}, }