Cash Transfers and Social Preferences of Children

We study the effects of an unconditional cash transfer program on social preferences of children. The program allocated $1,076 to randomly selected households in rural Kenya. We measure the social preferences of 4,022 children from 1,687 households with survey questions and incentivized behavioral games three years after the intervention. We distinguish between the direct effects on children of recipient households and the spillover effects on children of neighboring households. We do not find consistent evidence that children from treatment and spillover groups are more or less prosocial than children from the control group. Additionally, we find no persistent economic effects of the program. We find some evidence of reduced psychological well-being among adults and children in spillover households.