Speaker
Description
We study the effect of proximity to sexual assault events reported by media on women’s education in India. By combining novel geocoded data on media coverage of sexual crimes with nationally representative micro-data, we find that one standard deviation increase in the lagged average distance to sexual assaults increases the schooling of women by 0.17 years and the chances of middle school completion by 1.05 percentage points. Regions that have more access to television, radio, internet, and cellular devices drive our results. The effect is stronger in localities with higher son preferences, a proxy for gender norms. Our estimates are robust to empirical specifications that remove the effects of reported crimes. The results survive sensitivity and falsification checks. These findings highlight that while mass media can influence the stigma and threat of sexual violence, it can also exacerbate the problem of underinvestment in girls’ education by families in conservative societies.
| Keyword | Gender Economics |
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