Young Lives Working Paper 138. Growth in Middle Childhood and Early Adolescence, and Its Association with Cognitive and Non-cognitive Skills at the Age of 15 Years: Evidence from Vietnam

Abstract

This paper uses longitudinal data gathered at the ages of 8, 12 and 15 years for nearly 1000 children born in 1994–95 in Vietnam to investigate their growth between survey rounds and the links between the growth velocities and children’s achievement in certain skills. We find that gender and the timing of puberty are the most important determinants of growth velocities. The growth velocities in the periods from 8 to 12 years and from 8 to 15 years of age are statistically significantly associated with cognitive achievement, but not with psychosocial competency. As far as intervention recommendations are concerned, we find that height-for-age at age 8 years is important because the effect of this factor is consistently positive and statistically significant on the major outcomes at the age of 15 years, such as height and cognitive achievement