Does shame and stigma undermine children’s learning? Evidence from four low- and middle-income countries September 2016 Shame, blame and responsibility panel, DSA Paul Dornan (ODID/ Young Lives) and Maria Jose Ogando Portela,

1. Does shame and stigma undermine children’s
learning? Evidence from four low- and middle-
income countries
September 2016
Shame, blame and responsibility panel, DSA
Paul Dornan (ODID/ Young Lives) and Maria Jose Ogando
Portela, paul.dornan@qeh.ox.ac.uk

2. Background
1. Timely to think about shame and poverty
• Demonstrable importance to individuals
• Evidence of similarities across countries
• Policy interest in psychosocial capacities
2. Young Lives provides a unique longitudinal vehicle to look at child
poverty/ development using 4 country data
3. Aim: examine the associations between poverty and ‘shame’,
links between the following questions quantitatively using multi-
country data:
• How are family circumstances associated with children’s
reported feelings of shame and stigma?
• How is earlier shame/stigma reported by children associated
with later learning?

3. Advantages and limitations of the data for
this question
Advantages
1. Longitudinal approach
2. Detailed multicounty
data
3. Qualitative and
quantitative data
4. Data collected directly
from children and
caregivers
Limitations
1. Reliant on available
questions
2. Techniques identify
underlying associations, not
causal analysis
3. Analysis not tied to specific
programmes
4. Sentinel site, not national
random sampling

4. Analytic approach
Poor children feel shy in front of their friends because
they don’t wear clothes and shoes the same as them. They
dislike interacting with rich children. They hate their
school and their living areas
Quote from a focus group of girls in Addis Ababa aged 16-
17
Quantitative approach:
1. Define/ operationalize ‘shame’
2. Identify factors associated with shame at 12 years
3. Identify associations between shame at 12 years, and
learning indicators at 12 years and at 15 years

5. Measure
of shame
Housing: 'I feel proud to show my friends or other
visitors where I live’
Clothing: 'I am ashamed of my clothes‘
School: 'I am often embarrassed because I do not have
the right books, pencils and other equipment for school'
Work: 'The job I do makes me feel proud'
Index 8 questions which measure children’s feelings in
domains of their lives. Questions are indirectly related to
poverty (hence ‘poverty-related shame’)
1. Measuring shame at 12 years of age

6. 0
20406080
100%
(poorest) 2 3 4 (least poor)
Ethiopia
0
20406080
100%
(poorest) 2 3 4 (least poor)
Andhra Pradesh
0
20406080
100%
(poorest) 2 3 4 (least poor)
Peru
0
20406080
100%
(poorest) 2 3 4 (least poor)
Vietnam
Poor children more likely to feel shame
2. Which children report shame at 12 years old?
Simple descriptive analysis:
-> Poverty and
parental education level
both associated with shame.
Nationally specific patterns
by location, ethnicity and
gender
Regression results:
-> Consumption level and
parental education remain
important
-> In an extended model,
feelings of inclusion and
caregiver’s higher feelings of
shame also important

7. 3. How was earlier shame associated with
learning? – findings
On top of other household and child circumstances, including
poverty:
-> At 12 years
• Evidence linking shame with lower maths, vocabulary, and
reading/writing simple sentence performance in three
countries (not Vietnam), significant in half the models tested.
-> By 15 years
• Shame at 12 years associated with lower maths, vocabulary by
15 years. Also with school exit in Andhra Pradesh (only), again
significant in half the models tested.
• When controlling for prior scores, disadvantage persists–
suggesting change between 12 and 15 years
• Shame felt at 12 years predicts shame felt at 15 years in two
countries, but strongly only in one (Peru), suggesting potential
for change

8. Implications
Summary findings:
• Household expenditure and parental education were each associated
with feelings of shame at age 12. Likely that feelings of inclusion are
also important. There is an association between parental and child
feelings of shame.
• Examining associations between shame and cognitive indicators,
suggests evidence shame was associated with independent effects on
learning with some evidence from each country, and across different
measures.
Implications:
1. Poverty induced shame/ stigma cause indignity. Contribution of this
evidence is to highlight potential impacts on human capital
development.
2. Specifically poverty induced-shame/stigma likely to be a channel
undermining social mobility
3. Building knowledge about mechanisms linking shame and human
development – in research and in policy evaluations

9. Thank you