Early Childcare and Child Development
Kirstine Hansen and Denise Hawkes
Centre for Longitudinal Studies
Institute of Education
University of London
k.hansen@ioe.ac.uk
e
following lives from birth and through the adult years
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Background

Nowadays many more children experience nonmaternal childcare when they are young than in the
past.
 The effect this may have on their cognitive and
behavioural development is unclear.
 This paper uses data from the UK for a sample of
children in the Millennium Cohort Study to test how
different forms of childcare at an early age play a role
in the production of cognitive skills and the
behavioural development of young children.
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Literature

There is no consensus in the empirical literature, but as data improve and
the range of empirical evidence grows, findings suggest that how children
suffer (or benefit) from non-maternal care depends on the quality of
alternative care being provided.

Characteristics of childcare quality commonly found to be positively
associated with child cognitive outcomes include:
 The qualifications of care providers;
 stability of staff;
 structure and content of daily activities;
 the space and facilities used to provide the care.

This means that, where quality of care is not directly observed, formal care
settings (nurseries, crèches, child-minders, nannies and au-pairs) with
qualified staff and a structured curriculum provided in specially equipped
facilities are, on average, more likely to be associated with the positive
cognitive development of a child than less formal childcare settings (care
provided by relatives, friends and neighbours).
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The relationship between quality of childcare and
behavioural development seems to be less clear.





What appears to matter more for behavioural outcomes is the type of care.
Evidence from the US show that children who experience non-relative care,
and in particular formal group care, are more likely to show behavioural
problems than children using other types of childcare (Belsky et al. 2007)
While there is less evidence from the UK, the evidence there is does not
concur with the US findings.
Results from the Effective Provision of Pre-School Education Project (EPPE)
show that children who attend pre-school have a better start at school in
terms of behavioural development than children who don’t experience preschool.
The authors argue that pre-school helps to develop the social skills required
for a good start at school. The effects of pre-school are most advantageous
for those from disadvantaged background (Sammons et al. 2002).
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Data: Millennium Cohort Study.





Longitudinal Survey of around 19,000 children born in
the UK over a twelve month period and living in
selected UK wards at age 9 months.
The first survey took when the children were around 9
months old.
This provides the information on early childcare use.
The second survey took place when the children were
around 3 years of age.
Child outcomes are measured at age 3.
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Early Childcare Data

Measured at 9 months.

We want to emphasise early childcare use because:




much of the debate has been about the effect of removing children from their mothers
at an early age;
UK policy is increasingly emphasising the need to provide structured early education
from birth (see the Childcare Act 2006)
because childcare is observed before the outcomes are measured this provides a
more exogenous childcare variable.
Care is broken down into the following groups:





Formal group care: Nursery and creche.
Formal non-group care: childminder, nanny/au pair.
Grandparent care: Any grandparent care – mostly done by the maternal grandmother.
Partner care – father or partner of mother.
Other informal care: Other relatives, friends, neighbours.
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Childcare use by working mothers when the
children are aged 9 months
Main form of child care
Percent
Formal group care
22.8
Formal non-group care
17.3
Partner
19.8
Grandparent
35.4
Other informal
4.7
Observations
5097
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Child Outcome Measures

British Ability Scale (BAS)
• Naming vocabulary test
• Bracken School Readiness
• Colours, numbers, letters, sizes, shapes.
• Behaviour SDQ

consists of 25 items generating an overall score as well
as scores for five subscales measuring: conduct
problems; hyperactivity; emotional symptoms; peer
problems; and pro-social behaviour. The items are
assessed via parental report, normally by the mother.
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Mean child outcomes at age 3
BAS
Bracken
SDQ
Main childcare
use at 9
months
Mean
S.E.
Mean
S.E.
Mean
S.E.
All
0.024
0.020
0.054
0.026
-0.012
0.020
Formal group
care
0.084
0.036
0.341
0.041
-0.202
0.027
Formal nongroup care
0.109
0.043
0.136
0.049
-0.161
0.044
Partner
-0.126
0.038
-0.162
0.041
0.094
0.040
Grandparent
0.062
0.027
-0.022
0.030
0.122
0.028
Other informal
-0.236
0.067
-0.177
0.069
0.009
0.065
5097
5097
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5097
5097
following
lives from birth and
through the 5097
adult years
Observations
5097
Vocabulary
Independent
Variables
Formal nongroup care
Partner
Grandparent care
Other informal
Inc. work
Inc. goods
Inc. child
Full Model
(1)
(2)
(3)
(4)
(5)
-0.025
(0.051)
0.024
(0.051)
0.050
(0.050)
0.058
(0.051)
0.081
(0.050)
-0.210
(0.051)***
-0.184
(0.054)***
-0.046
(0.051)
-0.126
(0.051)**
-0.024
(0.052)
-0.022
(0.043)
-0.002
(0.045)
0.100
(0.043)***
0.003
(0.007)
0.112
(0.044)**
-0.320
(0.074)***
-0.313
(0.074)***
-0.131
(0.073)
-0.274
(0.074)***
-0.106
(0.073)
Basic
Model
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School Readiness
Inc. work
Inc. goods
Inc. child
Full Model
(1)
(2)
(3)
(4)
(5)
Formal non-group
care
-0.205
(0.050)***
-0.203
(0.050)***
-0.180
(0.047)***
-0.173
(0.049)***
-0.142
(0.047)***
Partner
-0.503
(0.054)***
-0.474
(0.055)***
-0.303
(0.051)***
-0.425
(0.053)***
-0.246
(0.052)***
Grandparent care
-0.363
(0.042)***
-0.347
(0.041)***
-0.212
(0.042)***
-0.347
(0.042)***
-0.204
(0.041)***
Other informal
-0.519
(0.068)***
-0.513
(0.067)***
-0.300
(0.068)***
-0.478
(0.066)***
-0.273
(0.066)***
Independent
Variables
Basic
Model
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Behaviour
Inc. work
Inc. goods
Inc. child
Full Model
(1)
(2)
(3)
(4)
(5)
0.041
(0.048)
0.048
(0.047)
0.028
(0.048)
0.036
(0.047)
0.027
(0.047)
Partner
0.296
(0.050)***
0.279
(0.051)***
0.133
(0.050)**
0.299
(0.053)***
0.132
(0.055)**
Grandparent
care
0.324
(0.036)***
0.300
(0.035)***
0.199
(0.036)***
0.321
(0.035)***
0.183
(0.036)***
Other informal
0.211
(0.070)***
0.200
(0.070)***
0.042
(0.068)
0.214
(0.071)***
0.043
(0.070)
Independent
Variables
Formal nongroup care
Basic
Model
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Results - Vocabulary






Vocabulary score grandparent care is positively associated with outcomes.
This makes sense because grandparents may not be able to provide the academic
facilities or stimuli that formal care providers can but they are likely to talk and
interact with children more frequently and on a one-to-one basis. However, it is not
the nature of the one-to-one care which solely produces the positive relationship. The
relationship does not exist for children using other non-group settings. It is specific to
grandparent care.
Possible explanations include the fact that grandparents may talk to children more
than other carers, not only because they have more time, but because they
compensate for a reduction in physical activities with the child (Tamis et al. 2004).
There is also evidence that suggests that older people, adjusting for qualifications,
tend to use grammatically correct sentences and speak more slowly to children
(Griffin and Spieler 2006).
Moreover, older people do not easily tolerate grammatical errors and they resort
more than younger people to corrective input when interacting with children which
helps develop language (Strapp 1999).
In a sense grandparent care is producing both a quality (of language production) and
quantity effect.
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Results – School Readiness








School Readiness:
Formal group care is associated with better cognitive scores than other types of care.
Possible reasons for this include: formal group care is more likely to offer structure
and content of daily activities, formal carers are more likely to be trained, more likely
to have better facilities and resources and access to more educational stimulation.
Formal non-group care is worse than formal group care but better than the informal
types of care for school readiness. All types of informal care are negatively
associated with Bracken School Readiness Scores compared to formal care.
Behavioural scores:
Children using grandparent and partner care have higher behavioural scores
(indicating more problem behaviour) than children using other forms of childcare.
If we look within the categories of the behavioural measurement - the result is largely
driven by these children scoring poorly on the peer relation scale.
This may be because the children cared for by grandparents and partners have less
contact with other children outside of the family and are probably being cared for
alone.
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Subgroup analysis




The analysis so far has considered children attending each childcare setting
as a homogenous group.
However, in reality children within each care setting will vary considerably.
For this reason we consider whether childcare is related to child outcomes
differentially across different groups of children.
To test this the full specification model was applied separately to different
groups of children: girls compared to boys; those with low educated mothers
(who left school at the compulsory school leaving age) compared to high
educated mothers (those with post-compulsory schooling); those in lone
parent families compared to two parent families; those with young mothers
(aged under 20) compared to older mothers (aged 21 plus); and children in
households claiming benefits compared to households not claiming benefits.
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Regression of childcare on BAS, Bracken and SDQ scores for
different sub-groups
Sub-groups
BAS Vocabulary
Bracken School
Readiness
SDQ Behaviour
Sample Size
Girls
0.114 (0.038)***
0.262 (0.047)***
0.110 (0.046)**
2530
Boys
0.080 (0.049)
0.126 (0.052)**
0.143 (0.043)***
2567
Low Educated
Mothers
0.068 (0.055)
0.194 (0.077)**
0.138 (0.057)**
1746
High Educated
Mothers
0.108 (0.043)**
0.191 (0.039)***
0.125 (0.039)**
3351
0.071(0.097)
0.231 (0.136)*
0.237 (0.126)***
414
0.097 (0.034)***
0.189 (0.036)***
0.121 (0.032)**
4683
Young Mother
-0.013 (0.078)
0.447 (0.134)***
0.148 (0.083)**
858
Older Mother
0.094 (0.036)***
0.198 (0.037)***
0.138 (0.034)***
4239
0.072 (0.080)
0.258 (0.104)**
0.111 (0.076)
961
Lone Parents
Couples
Parents on
benefits
No
benefits
0.098 (0.034)***
0.185 (0.039)***
following lives from birth and through the adult years
0.135 (0.032)***
4136
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Summary 1



The results suggest that formal group childcare in the first 9 months of life is
positively associated with the Bracken School Readiness Scores at 3 years
old whilst grandparent care in the first 9 months of life is positively
associated with the BAS vocabulary test scores at 3 years old.
The results for the SDQ behavioural scores show that grandparent and
partner care are positively associated with behavioural problems as
identified by mothers.
The results indicate that childcare covers a variety of different types of care
arrangements which are likely to vary in the degree to which they educate
and / or care for the child. Different types of care are likely to provide
different experiences for the child, and as a result, the various care
arrangements examined here, are differentially related to the three child
outcomes measured in this paper.
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Summary 2

The results also show that different relationships between
childcare and child outcomes exist for different groups of
children.
 Grandparent care was shown only to be positively, and
statistically significantly, associated with the vocabulary scores
for the more advantaged groups: This may reflect the better
vocabulary skills of grandmothers in these types of families.
 The association between formal group care and school
readiness, on the other hand, is completely different.
 On the whole, the association between school readiness and
formal group care is larger for the more disadvantaged groups.
 The association for the SDQ behavioural score suggests that
the relationship between grandparent care and behavioural
problems is stronger for the less advantaged children.
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Summary 3

However, we need to be slightly cautious when interpreting
these findings as, although we measure childcare and all other
control variables at age 9 months (t-1) and child outcomes at
age 3 (t), we can not be sure we are measuring any causal
relationship.
 Moreover, we would ideally like to be able to elaborate on what
it is about the different forms of childcare that are differentially
associated with the child outcomes.
 For this we would need information on how the children are
cared for in different settings, which do not exist in the data.
 Future research - see whether the findings presented persist as
the children get older and gain experience of other forms and
durations of childcare and begin school. This research will be
possible with future sweeps of MCS data.
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