Skip to main content
Home
  • Data & Research
  • Publications
  • Findings & Impact
  • Search

  • Themes
  • Blog
  • About
  • News & Events
  • People
  • Countries

Home+
Themes+
Poverty & Inequality+
Inequality
Migration and mobility
Poverty and shocks
Social protection
Well-being and aspirations
Health & Nutrition+
Early childhood development
Malnutrition and cognitive development
Stunting and catch-up growth
Water and Sanitation
Education+
Early education
Low-fee private schooling
Low-fee private schooling
School effectiveness
Adolescence, Youth and Gender+
Gender
Marriage and parenthood
Child protection+
Children's work
Early marriage and FGM
Violence
Skills & Work
Blog
About
News & Events+
Events
Past events
Young Lives in the media
Our Research Films
Galleries
People+
Young Lives Associates
International Advisory Board
Research Partners
Countries

You are here

  • Home
  • Home
  • Publications
  • Do Boys Eat Better than Girls in India?

Publications

  • Do Boys Eat Better than Girls in India?

Share

 
Tweet
Email

Do Boys Eat Better than Girls in India?

March, 2016
Elisabetta Aurino
  • Health & Nutrition
  • Gender
Young Lives Working Paper 146
PDF icon YL-WP146-Aurino_Do-Boys-Eat-Better-than-Girls.pdf

Preview

This paper examines gender inequalities in the quality of children’s diet, as defined by dietary diversity, among children growing up in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. Dietary diversity is a fundamental aspect of good nutrition: a varied diet is essential for ensuring an adequate intake of the macro- and micro-nutrients (vitamins and minerals) that are required for children’s healthy growth and proper physical and cognitive development.

The empirical results show that:

  • While there are no gender disparities in dietary quality for children aged 5, 8 and 12 years old, a wide pro-boy gap emerges in the middle of adolescence at 15 years old.
  • 15-year-old girls are less likely to consume the foods that contain most of the protein and micronutrients that are necessary for healthy development, such as eggs, legumes, root vegetables, fruit and meat.
  • Boys whose caregivers who have high aspirations for their children’s education are particularly advantaged in the allocation of food within the household.

The results are robust even when controlling for factors that may explain the observed gender gap (onset of puberty, time-use and time spent working or at school, as well as dietary behaviours such as skipping meals).

In the context of India, these findings are important for a number of reasons. First, India is home to the largest youth population in the world and adolescent health is a key policy priority. Second, the burden of malnutrition among both girls and young women is the highest in the world. Furthermore, improving adolescent girls’ diets, beyond being a development objective per se, can also help to break the intergenerational cycle of malnutrition.

About

Our people
Our funders
Our research
Contact Young Lives

Newsletter signup

Where we work

  • Ethiopia
  • India
  • Peru
  • Vietnam

Our themes

  • Poverty & Inequality
  • Health & Nutrition
  • Education
  • Gender & Youth
  • Child Protection
  • Skills & Work

Oxford Department of  International Development (ODID)
University of Oxford,  Queen Elizabeth House
3 Mansfield Road, Oxford, OX1 3TB, UK

Copyright 2021 Young Lives
|Privacy policy|Accessibility Statement|Sitemap