Purpose

This study explores how parents’ choice of taking parental leave relates to preschoolers’ developmental outcomes at 36 months old and 48 months old. We also examine the relationship between parental leave and the developmental progress from 36 months to 48 months old.

Design/methodology/approach

Data come from two waves of the survey of Kids in Taiwan: National Longitudinal Study of Child Development and Care. The observations in this study include 1,891 preschoolers (with an almost balanced gender ratio) when they were 36 months old and 48 months old. All data were reported by the primary caregivers: 79.7% by biological mothers, 17.5% by biological fathers, and the remainder by other caregivers. We use the principal components analysis (PCA) to select variables for the developmental outcomes and propensity score matching (PSM) to mitigate the potential threat of endogeneity from the ordinary least square (OLS) estimations.

Findings/results

Preschoolers whose parents take parental leave show better developmental outcomes in t tests. After controlling for additional variables and applying the PSM, there is almost no statistically significant relationship between parental leave and developmental outcomes. Estimation results suggest that other factors, including female children, Taiwanese mothers, firstborns, the higher education level of parents and higher monthly income, are associated with better developmental outcomes. When we divide the sample into higher- and lower-income families, the developmental advantage of female children does not exist in lower-income families, while the advantage of Taiwanese mothers does not exist in higher-income families when children are 36 months old. The progress between 36 and 48 months is also not significantly correlated with parental leave status. We argue that higher-educated parents are more likely to take parental leave, and these parents may also utilize more resources to promote children’s development. This may explain why we do not observe significant correlations with parental leave in the regression models.

Originality/value

Study on the relationship between parental leave and preschoolers’ developmental outcomes needs to consider children’s gender and the family’s socioeconomic background.