Benefits of Multidimensional Measures of Child Well Being in China

Abstract

In recent decades, measures of child well-being have evolved from single dimension to multidimensional measures. Multi-dimensional measures deepen and broaden our understanding of child well-being and inform us of areas of neglect. Child well-being in China today is measured through proxy measures of household need. This paper discusses the evolution of child well-being measures more generally, explores the benefits of positive indicators and multiple dimensions in formulating policy, and then reviews efforts to date by the Chinese government, researchers, and non-governmental and intergovernmental organizations to develop comprehensive multidimensional measures of child well-being in China. The domains and their potential interactions, as well as data sources and availability, are presented. The authors believe that child well-being in China would benefit from the development of a multidimensional index and that there is sufficient data to develop such an index.

The Capability Approach to Adolescent Poverty in China: Application of a Latent Class Model

“…Based on the availability of data, knowledge of the types of indicators used in other national indicators, shared capability approach supporters, and indicator data available for multidimensional indicators in China [19,26,27], we selected and measured 9 appropriate indicators.…”