Improving children’s life chances is central to development in low- and middle-income countries. Half the population of sub-Saharan Africa are aged 18 or younger, and young people comprise nearly half of all people living in extreme poverty worldwide. Poverty undermines not only children’s rights to life, survival, and development, as enshrined in the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, but also the skills and capabilities that fast-changing economies need for future growth. By extension, given poverty is a key mechanism shaping later chances, eradicating it is key to improving equality of opportunity. This article presents longitudinal analysis on inequities in children’s development trajectories, drawing on data from the Young Lives cohort study. Young Lives is following the lives of 12,000 children growing up in Ethiopia, India, Peru, and Vietnam. The article’s central questions are to understand how, why, and when inequalities become established through childhood. We explore how children and young people’s trajectories diverge over time; and we provide preliminary findings on education, nutrition, and youth transitions to higher education, work, and marriage and parenthood, from the latest survey round. We find that the poorest children, those in rural areas and/or from marginalized social groups, are consistently being ‘left behind’ in terms of nutritional status, learning, and opportunities to continue in education. We conclude by considering how policy interventions at different stages of the early life-course can mitigate the development of such inequalities.

Alderman, H. and Walker, S. (2014) Enhancing Resilience to Nutritional Shocks [online], 2020 Conference Brief 17, Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) <http://ebrary.ifpri.org/cdm/ref/collection/p15738coll2/id/128139> [accessed 22 January 2015].

Ban Ki-moon (2012) ‘An initiative of the Secretary-General’ [online], Global Education First Initiative <www.globaleducationfirst.org/289.htm> [accessed 23 January 2015].

Batana, Y., Bussolo, M. and Cockburn, J. (2013) ‘Global extreme poverty rates for children, adults and the elderly’, Economics Letters 120: 405–7 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.econlet.2013.05.006>.

Bird, K. (2007) The Intergenerational Transmission of Poverty: An Overview, ODI Working Paper 286/CPRC Working Paper 99, London: Overseas Development Institute.

Blanden, J., Gregg, P. and Machin, S. (2005) Intergenerational Mobility in Europe and North America: A Report Supported by the Sutton Trust, London: Centre for Economic Performance.

Boyden, J. and Dercon, S. (2012) Child Development and Economic Development: Lessons and Future Challenges, Oxford: Young Lives.

Boyden, J., Pankhurst, A. and Tafere, Y. (2013) Harmful Traditional Practices and Child Protection: Contested Understandings and Practices of Female Child Marriage and Circumcision, Working Paper 93, Oxford: Young Lives.

Bradshaw, J. and Finch, N. (2002) A Comparison of Child Benefit Packages in 22 Countries, Department for Work and Pensions Research Report No. 174, London: Corporate Document Services.

Chetty, R., Hendren, N., Kline, P. and Saez, E. (2014) Where is the Land of Opportunity? The Geography of Intergenerational Mobility in the United States, Working Paper 19844, Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research.

Collier, P. (2008) The Bottom Billion, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Crivello, G. (2011) ‘“Becoming somebody”: youth transitions through education and migration in Peru’, Journal of Youth Studies 14: 395–411 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13676261.2010.538043>.

Crookston, B., Schott, W., Cueto, S., Dearden, K., Engle, P., Georgiadis, A., Lundeen, E., Penny, M., Stein, A. and Behrman, J. (2013) ‘Post-infancy growth, schooling, and cognitive achievement: young lives’, American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, [online version September 2013] <http://dx.doi.org/10.3945/ajcn.113.067561>.

Cueto, S., Guerrero, G., Leon, J., Zapata, M. and Freire, S. (2014) ‘The relationship between socioeconomic status at age one, opportunities to learn and achievement in mathematics in fourth grade in Peru’, Oxford Review of Education 40: 50–72 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03054985.2013.873525>.

Dercon, S. and Sánchez, A. (2013) ‘Height in mid childhood and psychosocial competencies in late childhood: evidence from four developing countries’, Economics & Human Biology 11: 426–32 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ehb.2013.04.001>.

Diers, J. (2013) ‘Why the world needs to get serious about adolescents: a view from UNICEF’, Journal of Research on Adolescence 23: 214–22 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/jora.12042>.

Dornan, P. and Pells, K. (2014) From Infancy to Adolescence: Preliminary Findings from Round 4 of Young Lives, Oxford: Young Lives.

Engle, P., Fernald, L., Alderman, H., Behrman, J.R., O’Gara, C., Yousafzai, A., Cabral de Mello, M., Hidrobo, M., Ulkuer, N., Ertem, I., Iltus, S. and the Global Child Development Steering Group (2011) ‘Strategies for reducing inequalities and improving developmental outcomes for young children in low-income and middle-income countries’, The Lancet 378: 1339–53 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(11)60889-1>.

Gordon, D., Nandy, S., Pantazis, C., Pemberton, S. and Townsend, P. (2003) Child Poverty in the Developing World, Bristol: Policy Press.

Grantham-McGregor, S., Cheung, Y., Cueto, S., Glewwe, P., Richter, L. and Strupp, B. (2007) ‘Developmental potential in the first 5 years for children in developing countries’, The Lancet 369: 60–70 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(07)60032-4>.

Helmers, C. and Patnam, M. (2011) ‘The formation and evolution of childhood skill acquisition: evidence from India’, Journal of Development Economics 95: 252–66 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jdeveco.2010.03.001>.

International Labour Organization (ILO) (2014) World Social Protection Report 2014/15: Building Economic Recovery, Inclusive Development and Social Justice, Geneva: International Labour Organization.

Krishna, A. (2007) ‘For reducing poverty faster: target reasons before people’, World Development 35: 1947–60 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2006.12.003>.

Lewin, K. (2011) Making Rights Realities: Researching Educational Access, Transitions and Equity, Brighton, UK: CREATE, University of Sussex.

Lundeen, E., Behrman, J.R., Crookston, B., Dearden, K., Engle, P., Georgiadis, A., Penny, M. and Stein, A. (2013) ‘Growth faltering and recovery in children aged 1–8 years in four low- and middle-income countries: Young Lives’, Public Health Nutrition 7: 2131–7 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S1368980013003017>.

Malik, K. (ed.) (2014) Safeguarding Human Progress: Reducing Vulnerabilities, Building Resilience, New York: UNDP.

Morrow, V. (2013) ‘Whose values? Young people’s aspirations and experiences of schooling in Andhra Pradesh’, Children and Society 27: 258–69 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/chso.12036>.

Olinto, P., Beegle, K., Sobrado, C. and Uematsu, H. (2013) The State of the Poor: Where Are The Poor, Where Is Extreme Poverty Harder to End, and What Is the Current Profile of the World’s Poor? Washington, DC: World Bank.

Pells, K. and Woodhead, M. (2014) Changing Children’s Lives: Risks and Opportunities, Oxford: Young Lives.

Rogoff, B. (2003) The Cultural Nature of Human Development, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Rolleston, C. and James, Z. (2011) The Role of Schooling in Skill Development: Evidence from Young Lives in Ethiopia, India, Peru and Vietnam, Background paper prepared for the Education for All Global Monitoring Report 2012, Paris: UNESCO.

Rolleston, C., James, Z., Pasquier-Dumer, L., Tran, T. and Le, T.D. (2013) Making Progress: Report of the Young Lives School Survey in Vietnam, Working Paper 100, Oxford: Young Lives.

Sameroff, A. (ed.) (2009) The Transactional Model of Development: How Children and Contexts Shape Each Other, Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

Schott, W., Crookston, B., Lundeen, E., Stein, A., Behrman, J. and the Young Lives Determinants and Consequences of Child Growth Project Team (2013) ‘Periods of child growth up to age 8 years in Ethiopia, India, Peru and Vietnam: key distal household and community factors’, Social Science & Medicine 97: 278–87 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2013.05.016>.

Singh, A. (2014) Emergence and Evolution of Learning Gaps across Countries: Panel Evidence from Ethiopia, India, Peru and Vietnam, Working Paper 124, Oxford: Young Lives.

Sumner, A. (2012) Where Will the World’s Poor Live? An Update on Global Poverty and the New Bottom Billion, Working Paper 305, Washington, DC: Center for Global Development.

United Nations (1989) Convention on the Rights of the Child, General Assembly Resolution 44/25, 20 November 1989, New York: United Nations.

United Nations (2014) The Millennium Development Goals Report, New York: United Nations.

United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UNDESA), Population Division (2013) Adolescent Fertility since the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) in Cairo, New York: United Nations.

UNESCO (2014) Teaching and Learning: Achieving Quality for All, EFA Global Monitoring Report 2013/4, Paris: UNESCO.

UN General Assembly (2014) Status of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, Report of the Secretary-General, New York: United Nations.

UNICEF (2011) The State of the World’s Children 2011: Adolescence: An Age of Opportunity, New York: UNICEF.

UNICEF (2013) Improving Child Nutrition: The Achievable Imperative for Global Progress, New York: UNICEF.

Vaz, A. (2014) Are Children Among the Poorest? Oxford: OPHI.

Walker, S., Wachs, T., Meeks Gardner, J., Lozoff, B., Wasserman, G., Pollitt, E., Carter, J. and the International Child Development Steering Group (2007) ‘Child development: risk factors for adverse outcomes in developing countries’, The Lancet 369: 145–57 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(07)60076-2>.

Wilkinson, R. and Pickett, K. (2009) The Spirit Level, London: Penguin.

Woldehanna, T. and Pankhurst, A. (2014) Youth and Development: Round 4 Preliminary Findings, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia: Young Lives.

Woodhead, M., Ames, P., Vennam, U., Abebe, W. and Streuli, N. (2009) Equity and Quality? Challenges for Early Childhood and Primary Education in Ethiopia, India and Peru, Bernard van Leer Foundation Working Paper 55, The Hague: Bernard van Leer Foundation.

Woodhead, M., Dornan, P. and Murray, H. (2013a) What Inequality Means for Children: Evidence from Young Lives, Oxford: Young Lives.

Woodhead, M., Frost, M. and James, Z. (2013b) ‘Does growth in private schooling contribute to Education for All? Evidence from a longitudinal, two cohort study in Andhra Pradesh, India’, International Journal of Educational Research 33: 65–73 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijedudev.2012.02.005>.

World Bank (2012) Jobs: World Development Report 2013, Washington, DC: World Bank.

World Health Organization (2006) WHO Child Growth Standards: Length/height-for-age, weight-for-age, weight-for-length, weight-for-height and body mass index-for-age: Methods and Development [pdf], Geneva: World Health Organization <www.who.int/childgrowth/standards/Technical_report.pdf?ua=1> [accessed 29 April 2015].

Alderman, H. and Walker, S. (2014) Enhancing Resilience to Nutritional Shocks [online], 2020 Conference Brief 17, Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) <http://ebrary.ifpri.org/cdm/ref/collection/p15738coll2/id/128139> [accessed 22 January 2015].

Ban Ki-moon (2012) ‘An initiative of the Secretary-General’ [online], Global Education First Initiative <www.globaleducationfirst.org/289.htm> [accessed 23 January 2015].

Batana, Y., Bussolo, M. and Cockburn, J. (2013) ‘Global extreme poverty rates for children, adults and the elderly’, Economics Letters 120: 405–7 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.econlet.2013.05.006>.

Bird, K. (2007) The Intergenerational Transmission of Poverty: An Overview, ODI Working Paper 286/CPRC Working Paper 99, London: Overseas Development Institute.

Blanden, J., Gregg, P. and Machin, S. (2005) Intergenerational Mobility in Europe and North America: A Report Supported by the Sutton Trust, London: Centre for Economic Performance.

Boyden, J. and Dercon, S. (2012) Child Development and Economic Development: Lessons and Future Challenges, Oxford: Young Lives.

Boyden, J., Pankhurst, A. and Tafere, Y. (2013) Harmful Traditional Practices and Child Protection: Contested Understandings and Practices of Female Child Marriage and Circumcision, Working Paper 93, Oxford: Young Lives.

Bradshaw, J. and Finch, N. (2002) A Comparison of Child Benefit Packages in 22 Countries, Department for Work and Pensions Research Report No. 174, London: Corporate Document Services.

Chetty, R., Hendren, N., Kline, P. and Saez, E. (2014) Where is the Land of Opportunity? The Geography of Intergenerational Mobility in the United States, Working Paper 19844, Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research.

Collier, P. (2008) The Bottom Billion, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Crivello, G. (2011) ‘“Becoming somebody”: youth transitions through education and migration in Peru’, Journal of Youth Studies 14: 395–411 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13676261.2010.538043>.

Crookston, B., Schott, W., Cueto, S., Dearden, K., Engle, P., Georgiadis, A., Lundeen, E., Penny, M., Stein, A. and Behrman, J. (2013) ‘Post-infancy growth, schooling, and cognitive achievement: young lives’, American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, [online version September 2013] <http://dx.doi.org/10.3945/ajcn.113.067561>.

Cueto, S., Guerrero, G., Leon, J., Zapata, M. and Freire, S. (2014) ‘The relationship between socioeconomic status at age one, opportunities to learn and achievement in mathematics in fourth grade in Peru’, Oxford Review of Education 40: 50–72 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03054985.2013.873525>.

Dercon, S. and Sánchez, A. (2013) ‘Height in mid childhood and psychosocial competencies in late childhood: evidence from four developing countries’, Economics & Human Biology 11: 426–32 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ehb.2013.04.001>.

Diers, J. (2013) ‘Why the world needs to get serious about adolescents: a view from UNICEF’, Journal of Research on Adolescence 23: 214–22 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/jora.12042>.

Dornan, P. and Pells, K. (2014) From Infancy to Adolescence: Preliminary Findings from Round 4 of Young Lives, Oxford: Young Lives.

Engle, P., Fernald, L., Alderman, H., Behrman, J.R., O’Gara, C., Yousafzai, A., Cabral de Mello, M., Hidrobo, M., Ulkuer, N., Ertem, I., Iltus, S. and the Global Child Development Steering Group (2011) ‘Strategies for reducing inequalities and improving developmental outcomes for young children in low-income and middle-income countries’, The Lancet 378: 1339–53 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(11)60889-1>.

Gordon, D., Nandy, S., Pantazis, C., Pemberton, S. and Townsend, P. (2003) Child Poverty in the Developing World, Bristol: Policy Press.

Grantham-McGregor, S., Cheung, Y., Cueto, S., Glewwe, P., Richter, L. and Strupp, B. (2007) ‘Developmental potential in the first 5 years for children in developing countries’, The Lancet 369: 60–70 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(07)60032-4>.

Helmers, C. and Patnam, M. (2011) ‘The formation and evolution of childhood skill acquisition: evidence from India’, Journal of Development Economics 95: 252–66 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jdeveco.2010.03.001>.

International Labour Organization (ILO) (2014) World Social Protection Report 2014/15: Building Economic Recovery, Inclusive Development and Social Justice, Geneva: International Labour Organization.

Krishna, A. (2007) ‘For reducing poverty faster: target reasons before people’, World Development 35: 1947–60 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2006.12.003>.

Lewin, K. (2011) Making Rights Realities: Researching Educational Access, Transitions and Equity, Brighton, UK: CREATE, University of Sussex.

Lundeen, E., Behrman, J.R., Crookston, B., Dearden, K., Engle, P., Georgiadis, A., Penny, M. and Stein, A. (2013) ‘Growth faltering and recovery in children aged 1–8 years in four low- and middle-income countries: Young Lives’, Public Health Nutrition 7: 2131–7 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S1368980013003017>.

Malik, K. (ed.) (2014) Safeguarding Human Progress: Reducing Vulnerabilities, Building Resilience, New York: UNDP.

Morrow, V. (2013) ‘Whose values? Young people’s aspirations and experiences of schooling in Andhra Pradesh’, Children and Society 27: 258–69 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/chso.12036>.

Olinto, P., Beegle, K., Sobrado, C. and Uematsu, H. (2013) The State of the Poor: Where Are The Poor, Where Is Extreme Poverty Harder to End, and What Is the Current Profile of the World’s Poor? Washington, DC: World Bank.

Pells, K. and Woodhead, M. (2014) Changing Children’s Lives: Risks and Opportunities, Oxford: Young Lives.

Rogoff, B. (2003) The Cultural Nature of Human Development, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Rolleston, C. and James, Z. (2011) The Role of Schooling in Skill Development: Evidence from Young Lives in Ethiopia, India, Peru and Vietnam, Background paper prepared for the Education for All Global Monitoring Report 2012, Paris: UNESCO.

Rolleston, C., James, Z., Pasquier-Dumer, L., Tran, T. and Le, T.D. (2013) Making Progress: Report of the Young Lives School Survey in Vietnam, Working Paper 100, Oxford: Young Lives.

Sameroff, A. (ed.) (2009) The Transactional Model of Development: How Children and Contexts Shape Each Other, Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

Schott, W., Crookston, B., Lundeen, E., Stein, A., Behrman, J. and the Young Lives Determinants and Consequences of Child Growth Project Team (2013) ‘Periods of child growth up to age 8 years in Ethiopia, India, Peru and Vietnam: key distal household and community factors’, Social Science & Medicine 97: 278–87 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2013.05.016>.

Singh, A. (2014) Emergence and Evolution of Learning Gaps across Countries: Panel Evidence from Ethiopia, India, Peru and Vietnam, Working Paper 124, Oxford: Young Lives.

Sumner, A. (2012) Where Will the World’s Poor Live? An Update on Global Poverty and the New Bottom Billion, Working Paper 305, Washington, DC: Center for Global Development.

United Nations (1989) Convention on the Rights of the Child, General Assembly Resolution 44/25, 20 November 1989, New York: United Nations.

United Nations (2014) The Millennium Development Goals Report, New York: United Nations.

United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UNDESA), Population Division (2013) Adolescent Fertility since the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) in Cairo, New York: United Nations.

UNESCO (2014) Teaching and Learning: Achieving Quality for All, EFA Global Monitoring Report 2013/4, Paris: UNESCO.

UN General Assembly (2014) Status of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, Report of the Secretary-General, New York: United Nations.

UNICEF (2011) The State of the World’s Children 2011: Adolescence: An Age of Opportunity, New York: UNICEF.

UNICEF (2013) Improving Child Nutrition: The Achievable Imperative for Global Progress, New York: UNICEF.

Vaz, A. (2014) Are Children Among the Poorest? Oxford: OPHI.

Walker, S., Wachs, T., Meeks Gardner, J., Lozoff, B., Wasserman, G., Pollitt, E., Carter, J. and the International Child Development Steering Group (2007) ‘Child development: risk factors for adverse outcomes in developing countries’, The Lancet 369: 145–57 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(07)60076-2>.

Wilkinson, R. and Pickett, K. (2009) The Spirit Level, London: Penguin.

Woldehanna, T. and Pankhurst, A. (2014) Youth and Development: Round 4 Preliminary Findings, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia: Young Lives.

Woodhead, M., Ames, P., Vennam, U., Abebe, W. and Streuli, N. (2009) Equity and Quality? Challenges for Early Childhood and Primary Education in Ethiopia, India and Peru, Bernard van Leer Foundation Working Paper 55, The Hague: Bernard van Leer Foundation.

Woodhead, M., Dornan, P. and Murray, H. (2013a) What Inequality Means for Children: Evidence from Young Lives, Oxford: Young Lives.

Woodhead, M., Frost, M. and James, Z. (2013b) ‘Does growth in private schooling contribute to Education for All? Evidence from a longitudinal, two cohort study in Andhra Pradesh, India’, International Journal of Educational Research 33: 65–73 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijedudev.2012.02.005>.

World Bank (2012) Jobs: World Development Report 2013, Washington, DC: World Bank.

World Health Organization (2006) WHO Child Growth Standards: Length/height-for-age, weight-for-age, weight-for-length, weight-for-height and body mass index-for-age: Methods and Development [pdf], Geneva: World Health Organization <www.who.int/childgrowth/standards/Technical_report.pdf?ua=1> [accessed 29 April 2015].

Alderman, H. and Walker, S. (2014) Enhancing Resilience to Nutritional Shocks [online], 2020 Conference Brief 17, Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) <http://ebrary.ifpri.org/cdm/ref/collection/p15738coll2/id/128139> [accessed 22 January 2015].

Ban Ki-moon (2012) ‘An initiative of the Secretary-General’ [online], Global Education First Initiative <www.globaleducationfirst.org/289.htm> [accessed 23 January 2015].

Batana, Y., Bussolo, M. and Cockburn, J. (2013) ‘Global extreme poverty rates for children, adults and the elderly’, Economics Letters 120: 405–7 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.econlet.2013.05.006>.

Bird, K. (2007) The Intergenerational Transmission of Poverty: An Overview, ODI Working Paper 286/CPRC Working Paper 99, London: Overseas Development Institute.

Blanden, J., Gregg, P. and Machin, S. (2005) Intergenerational Mobility in Europe and North America: A Report Supported by the Sutton Trust, London: Centre for Economic Performance.

Boyden, J. and Dercon, S. (2012) Child Development and Economic Development: Lessons and Future Challenges, Oxford: Young Lives.

Boyden, J., Pankhurst, A. and Tafere, Y. (2013) Harmful Traditional Practices and Child Protection: Contested Understandings and Practices of Female Child Marriage and Circumcision, Working Paper 93, Oxford: Young Lives.

Bradshaw, J. and Finch, N. (2002) A Comparison of Child Benefit Packages in 22 Countries, Department for Work and Pensions Research Report No. 174, London: Corporate Document Services.

Chetty, R., Hendren, N., Kline, P. and Saez, E. (2014) Where is the Land of Opportunity? The Geography of Intergenerational Mobility in the United States, Working Paper 19844, Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research.

Collier, P. (2008) The Bottom Billion, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Crivello, G. (2011) ‘“Becoming somebody”: youth transitions through education and migration in Peru’, Journal of Youth Studies 14: 395–411 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13676261.2010.538043>.

Crookston, B., Schott, W., Cueto, S., Dearden, K., Engle, P., Georgiadis, A., Lundeen, E., Penny, M., Stein, A. and Behrman, J. (2013) ‘Post-infancy growth, schooling, and cognitive achievement: young lives’, American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, [online version September 2013] <http://dx.doi.org/10.3945/ajcn.113.067561>.

Cueto, S., Guerrero, G., Leon, J., Zapata, M. and Freire, S. (2014) ‘The relationship between socioeconomic status at age one, opportunities to learn and achievement in mathematics in fourth grade in Peru’, Oxford Review of Education 40: 50–72 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03054985.2013.873525>.

Dercon, S. and Sánchez, A. (2013) ‘Height in mid childhood and psychosocial competencies in late childhood: evidence from four developing countries’, Economics & Human Biology 11: 426–32 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ehb.2013.04.001>.

Diers, J. (2013) ‘Why the world needs to get serious about adolescents: a view from UNICEF’, Journal of Research on Adolescence 23: 214–22 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/jora.12042>.

Dornan, P. and Pells, K. (2014) From Infancy to Adolescence: Preliminary Findings from Round 4 of Young Lives, Oxford: Young Lives.

Engle, P., Fernald, L., Alderman, H., Behrman, J.R., O’Gara, C., Yousafzai, A., Cabral de Mello, M., Hidrobo, M., Ulkuer, N., Ertem, I., Iltus, S. and the Global Child Development Steering Group (2011) ‘Strategies for reducing inequalities and improving developmental outcomes for young children in low-income and middle-income countries’, The Lancet 378: 1339–53 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(11)60889-1>.

Gordon, D., Nandy, S., Pantazis, C., Pemberton, S. and Townsend, P. (2003) Child Poverty in the Developing World, Bristol: Policy Press.

Grantham-McGregor, S., Cheung, Y., Cueto, S., Glewwe, P., Richter, L. and Strupp, B. (2007) ‘Developmental potential in the first 5 years for children in developing countries’, The Lancet 369: 60–70 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(07)60032-4>.

Helmers, C. and Patnam, M. (2011) ‘The formation and evolution of childhood skill acquisition: evidence from India’, Journal of Development Economics 95: 252–66 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jdeveco.2010.03.001>.

International Labour Organization (ILO) (2014) World Social Protection Report 2014/15: Building Economic Recovery, Inclusive Development and Social Justice, Geneva: International Labour Organization.

Krishna, A. (2007) ‘For reducing poverty faster: target reasons before people’, World Development 35: 1947–60 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2006.12.003>.

Lewin, K. (2011) Making Rights Realities: Researching Educational Access, Transitions and Equity, Brighton, UK: CREATE, University of Sussex.

Lundeen, E., Behrman, J.R., Crookston, B., Dearden, K., Engle, P., Georgiadis, A., Penny, M. and Stein, A. (2013) ‘Growth faltering and recovery in children aged 1–8 years in four low- and middle-income countries: Young Lives’, Public Health Nutrition 7: 2131–7 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S1368980013003017>.

Malik, K. (ed.) (2014) Safeguarding Human Progress: Reducing Vulnerabilities, Building Resilience, New York: UNDP.

Morrow, V. (2013) ‘Whose values? Young people’s aspirations and experiences of schooling in Andhra Pradesh’, Children and Society 27: 258–69 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/chso.12036>.

Olinto, P., Beegle, K., Sobrado, C. and Uematsu, H. (2013) The State of the Poor: Where Are The Poor, Where Is Extreme Poverty Harder to End, and What Is the Current Profile of the World’s Poor? Washington, DC: World Bank.

Pells, K. and Woodhead, M. (2014) Changing Children’s Lives: Risks and Opportunities, Oxford: Young Lives.

Rogoff, B. (2003) The Cultural Nature of Human Development, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Rolleston, C. and James, Z. (2011) The Role of Schooling in Skill Development: Evidence from Young Lives in Ethiopia, India, Peru and Vietnam, Background paper prepared for the Education for All Global Monitoring Report 2012, Paris: UNESCO.

Rolleston, C., James, Z., Pasquier-Dumer, L., Tran, T. and Le, T.D. (2013) Making Progress: Report of the Young Lives School Survey in Vietnam, Working Paper 100, Oxford: Young Lives.

Sameroff, A. (ed.) (2009) The Transactional Model of Development: How Children and Contexts Shape Each Other, Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

Schott, W., Crookston, B., Lundeen, E., Stein, A., Behrman, J. and the Young Lives Determinants and Consequences of Child Growth Project Team (2013) ‘Periods of child growth up to age 8 years in Ethiopia, India, Peru and Vietnam: key distal household and community factors’, Social Science & Medicine 97: 278–87 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2013.05.016>.

Singh, A. (2014) Emergence and Evolution of Learning Gaps across Countries: Panel Evidence from Ethiopia, India, Peru and Vietnam, Working Paper 124, Oxford: Young Lives.

Sumner, A. (2012) Where Will the World’s Poor Live? An Update on Global Poverty and the New Bottom Billion, Working Paper 305, Washington, DC: Center for Global Development.

United Nations (1989) Convention on the Rights of the Child, General Assembly Resolution 44/25, 20 November 1989, New York: United Nations.

United Nations (2014) The Millennium Development Goals Report, New York: United Nations.

United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UNDESA), Population Division (2013) Adolescent Fertility since the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) in Cairo, New York: United Nations.

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