Macroeconomic determinants of child abuse in Malaysia: an ARDL approach

Abstract

Child abuse in Malaysia always exhibits a steady increase. Previous studies focused on inflation and unemployment as factors in child abuse. This study includes economic growth as a potential determinant of child abuse. This study embarks on an investigation into the macroeconomic determinants, namely inflation, unemployment and economic growth, of child abuse in Malaysia. Data ranging from 1988 to 2017 were collected and the ARDL approach is employed and the results show that inflation, unemployment and economic growth do not affect child abuse in the long-run. However, in the short-run, all of these macroeconomic factors contribute to child abuse in Malaysia. Therefore, these findings are important for policy makers to formulate policies.