Household Members' Migration and the Education of Children Left Behind': Empirical Findings from Tajikistan and Reflections for Research Practice

There is growing recognition that when a household member migrates, there is a complex range of social as well as economic consequences for the everyday lives of those who remain in the origin household. This paper examines the children left behind phenomenon in Tajikistan, a country with very high rates of international labour migration. With the use of data from the Tajikistan 2007 Living Standards Survey, logistic regression modelling is applied to examine the impact of fathers', mothers', siblings', and other household members' migration on the school enrolment of secondary school-aged children. The results show that there is a significant positive association between longer-term parental migration and children's enrolment, whereas the long-term migration of siblings sending remittances and the mid-term migration of other household members (not parents or siblings) are both significantly negatively associated with children's enrolment. The findings highlight the importance of considering differences between children left behind. Copyright (c) 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.