The reasons why female participation is characteristically lower than that for males
have been enumerated in a recent research report (Brock 1991). They include factors,
with differing emphases in different countries, that are geographical (the physical
access to schools which often favours urban boys and discriminates against rural girls),
cultural (the result of marriage practices, the gender stereotyping in economic roles,
patriarchal social organisation), health related (preferential treatment of male children),
economic (the opportunity costs of schooling girls), religious (disposition inherent in
some religious practices), legal (asymmetric legal rights and ability to use the legal
protection that is available), political and administrative (interest groups and
implementation problems), and educational (especially where female teachers are
scarce, and where investment in boys education is favoured).
The case in favour of increasing female participation has many dimensions, most
obviously the simple observation that there is no equitable reason for the continued
existence of under enrolment compared to boys. There are many other aspects to the
case that illustrate that developmental benefits are available and that these probably
accrue at a greater marginal rate than for boys where enrolment disparities are large.
Early studies of the effects of female education on child health suggest that the impact
of women's schooling is about twice that for men (Cochrane, Leslie, O'Hara
1980,1982). A complex picture is provided by later studies which take a wide range of
approaches to controlling for possibly significant variables. In these there is no simple
consensus about the size of the effects but some agreement about the direction. Mensch,
Lentzner and Preston (1985) in a fifteen country study attribute considerable
significance to mother's education in relation to child mortality. Rosenzweig and
Schultz (1982) explored the determinants of male female survival in India in relation to
expected rates of return in the labour market. No significant effects of parental
schooling emerge in this study except that the difference in survival rates is less if
fathers have matriculated (there is no effect for mothers). Pitt and Rosenzweig (1985)
report greater incidence of illness in Indonesian households the higher the head of
household's education perhaps reflecting greater propensity to self report. The
education of wives has no effect on reported frequency of illness. Boulier and Paqueo
(1988) suggest that infant and child mortality in Shri Lanka is only reduced for mothers
who have ten years or more of education and there is no effect for less education. There
are many other studies (reviewed in Behrman 1991:67) and simple generalisations
across countries and without specification of controls are elusive. Such controls include
individual endowments (e.g. mother's height), community factors (good health care
associated with higher levels of schooling), interactions between mothers and fathers
schooling, and response biases in reported morbidity.
The direction of causality is also noted as problematic in some of the studies. There is
evidence from Indonesia (Pitt and Rosenzweig (1990) that a one standard deviation
increase in morbidity of siblings under four results in a 15% reduction in the number of