Providing regular care for grandchildren in Thailand: An analysis of the impact on grandparents’ health

Abstract

One of the many roles of grandparents is the role as caretaker for their grandchildren. Studies looking into the situation of older adults providing care for their grandchildren have found that care responsibilities can have beneficial effects but can also pose challenges to those providing it, depending on individual and societal circumstances. The objective of our study is to shed light on the health effects of providing care for grandchildren younger than 10 years of age on grandparents. Whether this experience has positive or negative effects on the caretaker's health depends on a range of factors that we explore here in the context of Thailand.The study is based on the quantitative analysis of the 2011 round of the National Survey of Older Persons in Thailand. In order to control for endogeneity between health status and the provision of care, we apply several instrumental variable (IV) approaches in addition to regular regressions. In terms of health status, we make use of four health-related variables: self-reported health status, functional limitations, happiness level and information about negative feelings. The observed positive impact of grandparenting on three health outcomes that we find with non-endogeneity-controlled OLS analyses is likely due to reverse causality or self-selection into becoming a grandparent who provides care. The unbiased results imply that regularly taking care of young grandchildren does not provide any physical health benefits; to the contrary, it seems to have a negative impact on self-rated health, functional limitations and psychological well-being, supporting the role strain theory.