Dissertation Research: Parental Decisionmaking and Child Welfare in Thailand

University Of Washington, Seattle WA

Investigators

Abstract

This project investigates the parental logic, goals and decision making processes behind child welfare outcomes in Thailand from a bio-cultural evolutionary perspective. The dissertation research by a cultural anthropologist from the University of Washington will ascertain the characteristics of children at high risk for potentially hazardous welfare outcomes, and will clarify the causal pathways by which cultural, ecological, and biological factors interact to produce parental decisions. The project will compare patterns of investment in and labor extraction from children from different village and household types, investigate the cultural logic behind parental decision making, and study the implications for child welfare and parental reproductive success. Ethnographic interviewing and focus groups will provide qualitative insights into the motivations and intentions associated with parental strategizing and parental expectations of sons and daughters. Retrospective family history surveys will quantitatively explore household decision making focusing on five specific child welfare outcomes. The new knowledge from this project will be valuable to development policy planners, will advance our understanding of demographic transition theory, will help train a young social scientist, and will advance our knowledge of this important region of the world.