Maternal migration and child health: An analysis of disruption and adaptation processes in Benin

Children of migrant mothers have lower vaccination rates compared to their peers with non-migrant mothers in low-income countries. Explanations for this finding are typically grounded in the disruption and adaptation perspectives of migration. Researchers argue that migration is a disruptive process that interferes with women’s economic well-being and social networks, and ultimately their health-seeking behaviors. With time, however, migrant women adapt to their new settings, and their health behaviors improve. Despite prominence in the literature, no research tests the salience of these perspectives to the relationship between maternal migration and child vaccination. We innovatively leverage Demographic and Health Survey data to test the extent to which disruption and adaptation processes underlie the relationship between maternal migration and child vaccination in the context of Benin—a West African country where migration is common and child vaccination rates have declined in recent years. By disaggregating children of migrants according to whether they were born before or after their mother’s migration, we confirm that migration does not lower children’s vaccination rates in Benin. In fact, children born after migration enjoy a higher likelihood of vaccination, whereas their peers born in the community from which their mother eventually migrates are less likely to be vaccinated. Although we find no support for the disruption perspective of migration, we do find evidence of adaptation: children born after migration have an increased likelihood of vaccination the longer their mother resides in the destination community prior to their birth.