Table 1.
The effect of birth order on child HAZ, by preceding birth spacing
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | |
| Secondborn | −0.11*** (0.01) | |||||
| Third(+)-born | −0.22*** (0.01) | |||||
| Secondborn × PBS < 3 y | −0.16*** (0.01) | −0.16*** (0.01) | −0.16*** (0.03) | −0.15*** (0.03) | −0.39*** (0.07) | |
| Secondborn × PBS ≥ 3 y | 0.01 (0.02) | 0.01 (0.02) | 0.02 (0.03) | 0.03 (0.03) | −0.18** (0.08) | |
| Third(+)-born × PBS < 3 y | −0.26*** (0.02) | −0.26*** (0.02) | −0.25*** (0.03) | −0.22*** (0.04) | −0.65*** (0.08) | |
| Third(+)-born × PBS ≥ 3 y | −0.06*** (0.02) | −0.05** (0.02) | −0.04 (0.03) | −0.01 (0.04) | −0.25*** (0.08) | |
| Mean outcome of firstborn | −1.35 | −1.35 | −1.35 | −1.35 | −1.35 | −1.35 |
| PSU FE | No | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | No |
| Mother’s FE | No | No | No | No | No | Yes |
| Gestation length | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Previous pregnancy status | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Sibling size | No | No | No | No | Yes | No |
| Observations | 212,774 | 212,774 | 211,787 | 211,461 | 211,461 | 91,653 |
| R2 | 0.165 | 0.165 | 0.324 | 0.325 | 0.325 | 0.676 |
Authors’ calculation using sample of children aged 0 to 60 mo with valid data on child height, birth order, and birth spacing, extracted from NFHS-4 (2015/16). SEs appear in brackets and are clustered by mother in all regressions. Firstborn is an indicator for children whose birth order is 1 and is the omitted category; secondborn is an indicator for children whose birth order is 2; third(+)-born is an indicator for children whose birth order is 3 or higher; PBS < 3 y is an indicator for children who were born within 36 mo of the preceding birth to their mother; PBS ≥ 3 y is an indicator for children who were born 36 or more months after the preceding birth to their mother. Columns 1 and 2 include child-level variables: An indicator for child’s age (in months), gender and type of pregnancy outcome (single or multiple); mother-level variables, such as mother’s age at birth, height (in centimeters), a measure of diet diversity, and indicator variables for mother’s education, daily television viewing, reading of news weekly or more frequently, and low body mass index; household controls, which include a measure for household wealth computed using International Wealth Index, the number of people living in the household, and indicators for caste and religion of the head of the household head, access to safe handwashing facilities, access to piped water for drinking, open defecation, following of safe stool disposal practices, and a measure of community-level availability of improved toilet and location-specific controls (rural or urban and district dummies). Column 3 is the PSU FE and is on the sample of clusters with two or more children less than 5 y old. Cluster in NFHS sampling refers to the PSU, which is a village in rural India and a block or neighborhood in urban India. Column 4 is PSU FE + additional control for the confounding effect of duration of pregnancy and outcome of previous pregnancy of the mother (alive, dead, or terminated); this is our preferred/main specification. Column 5 controls for the confounding effect of sibling size along with column 4 controls. Column 6 is a mother’s FE is on the sample of mothers with two or more children less than 5 y of age. **P < 0.05, ***P < 0.01.