Data and Code for: What’s Behind Her Smile? Health, Looks, and Self-Esteem

Principal Investigator(s): View help for Principal Investigator(s) Francisco Gallego, PUC-Chile, Economics Department; Andrea Repetto, PUC-Chile, School of Government; Cristian Larroulet, Cambridge University

Version: View help for Version V1

Name	File Type	Size	Last Modified
Replication Package WBHS			01/18/2024 03:51:PM
Replication Package WBHS (1).zip	application/zip	3.3 MB	01/18/2024 11:25:AM
readme.pdf	application/pdf	188.7 KB	01/18/2024 11:25:AM

Project Citation:

Gallego, Francisco, Repetto, Andrea, and Larroulet, Cristian. Data and Code for: What’s Behind Her Smile? Health, Looks, and Self-Esteem. Nashville, TN: American Economic Association [publisher], 2024. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2024-02-28. https://doi.org/10.3886/E159261V1

Project Description

Summary: These files contain the program and data for the article "What’s Behind Her Smile? Health, Looks, and Self-Esteem".
The article examines how improving dental health affects economic, social, and psychological outcomes. In a randomized experiment, we provide a low-income group in Chile free dental care, including prostheses, and find significant and persistent impacts on men's and women's dental and self-perceived mental health. For women, treatment generates steady improvement in self-esteem, significant impact on appearance, short-run improvements in employment and earnings, and improvement in partner interactions. We find no impact for men in any of these dimensions. Heterogeneity analyses suggest that treatment effects on labor market outcomes are larger for women with more severe visible dental issues at baseline. In summary, we find that increasing access to dental care, including cosmetic elements, improves important aspects of people's lives.

Funding Sources: FONDECYT (1120539)

Scope of Project

Subject Terms: Randomized control trial; dental health; causal effects

JEL Classification:
      I12 Health Behavior
      J29 Time Allocation, Work Behavior, and Employment Determination: Other
      O15 Economic Development: Human Resources; Human Development; Income Distribution; Migration

Geographic Coverage: Santiago, Chile

Time Period(s): 2011 – 2015

Collection Date(s): 2011 – 2015

Universe: Subjects who applied for the dental health tratment offered. All of them live in the Santiago region in Chile.

Data Type(s): experimental data

Methodology

Response Rate: Baseline survey: All 799 subjects who participated in the RCT answered the survey.

First follow up survey: 642 people participated in this survey, corresponding to 80.4% of the original sample.

Second follow up survey: 547 people participated in this survey, corresponding to 68.5% of the original sample.

Sampling: The sample was constructed with the elegible people who applied for the dental treatment offered for this study.

Data Source: Survey data collected for the research team.

Collection Mode(s): on-site questionnaire

Scales:

The dataset includes data for several dimensions related to health, economic, psychological, and social outcomes. All the variables are labeled in the dataset and explained in the paper. We highlight light here three well known scales collected as part of this project.

The Oral Health Impact Profile (OHIP) . To measure oral health-related quality of

life, each participant answered the 14 questions of the Oral Health Impact Profile

(OHIP-14) developed by Slade (1997), translated into Spanish. The instrument collects information on seven dimensions: functional limitations, physical pain,

psychological discomfort, physical disability, psychological disability, social disability,

and handicaps. Each question is answered on a Likert scale basis. Scores

range between 0 and 56.

The Rosenberg Self-Esteem Test. To measure self-esteem, we use the Rosenberg

self-esteem test (Rosenberg, 1965). It consists of 10 statements on overall feelings of self-worth evaluated on a four-point Likert scale. Scores range between 0 and 30; a higher measure indicates higher overall self-esteem. We use the Spanish version validated for Chilean adults by Rojas-Barahona et al. (2009).

The SF-12 questionnaire (Ware et al., 1996). The instrument evaluates the impact of health on everyday life summarized into two components: physical and mental health. The score ranges from 0 to 100, where a higher score implies a better health-related quality of life. The physical health index includes physical functioning, bodily pain, general health perception, and role-health (heath issues interfering with work and activities). In turn, the mental health index considers energy and vitality,

social functioning, role-emotional (emotional issues limiting work and activities), and mental health perception.

Unit(s) of Observation: individuals

Related Publications

Download this project

Published Versions

V1 [2024-02-28]

Export Metadata

Dublin Core

DDI 2.5

Report a Problem

Found a serious problem with the data, such as disclosure risk or copyrighted content? Let us know.

This material is distributed exactly as received from the data depositor. As of April 2026, depositors are required to submit study materials in accessible formats. ICPSR has not reviewed, checked, or processed this material. For additional information about the study, please contact the investigator(s) directly. If you have questions about the accessibility of materials distributed by ICPSR or require further assistance, please visit ICPSR's Accessibility Center.