My research uses natural experiments and policy reforms to investigate the causes, consequences, and evolution of harmful traditional practices such as female genital cutting, bride abduction, and child marriage. I am also interested in understanding the link between social capital at the neighborhood level, the provision of informal guardianship, and the prevalence of crime in contexts where the capacity of the state to enforce the law is limited. As an advocate of evidence-informed policymaking, I also do research on the the determinants of evidence-based policy adoption and have been actively involved — and continue to participate — in the impact evaluation of social policies across multiple countries.
Ideological Alignment and Evidence-Based Policy Adoption (with Pedro Rey-Biel, Berkay Özcan, Ángel Martínez, Marcel Jansen and Antonio Roldán-Monés).
Conditionally accepted at the American Economic Review. Updated ungated version here. Previously published as an IZA Working Paper.
Recidivism and Neighborhood Institutions: Evidence from the Rise of the Pentecostal Church in Chile (with Andrés Barrios-Fernández).
Journal of Labor Economics. Vol 43(3), 2025, pages 725-762. Published version available here. Updated ungated version here. Previously published as a CEP Discussion Paper.
Specialised courts and the reporting of intimate partner violence: Evidence from Spain (with Marta Martínez Matute and Carmen Villa).
Journal of Public Economics. Vol 239, Nov 2024. Published version available here (open access). Previously published as an IZA working paper.
Long-Lasting Effects of Communist Indoctrination in School: Evidence from Poland (with Joan Costa-Font and Anna Nicinska).
European Economic Review. Vol 161, January 2024. Published version available here (open access). Previously published as an IZA working paper.
Cognitive Skills and Intra-household Allocation of Schooling (with Edoardo Masset)
Journal of Demographic Economics, Volume 90(2), 2024. Published version available here. Updated ungated version here. Previously published as a Working Paper series of the Department of Economics at the University of Sussex.
Age at Marriage and Divorce: Evidence from a Policy Reform in China (with Berkay Ôzcan).
Review of Economics of the Household, volume 22(1), 2024. Published version available here (open access). Previously published as a Working Paper of the Department of Social Policy at LSE.
Legal Bans, Female Genital Cutting and Education: Evidence from Senegal (with Edgar Salgado).
World Bank Economic Review, Volume 37(1), pages 74-92, February 2023. Published version available here (open access). Previously published as an LSE Department of Social Policy Working Paper.
Winner of the award I Premio Nada es Gratis to Job Market Papers in Economics.
The Institutional Origins of Vaccines Distrust: Evidence from Former-Communist Countries (with Joan Costa-Font and Anna Nicinska).
PLOS One, volume 18(3), 2023. Published version available here (open access).
Child marriage and Infant Mortality: Evidence from Ethiopia
Journal of Population Economics, Volume 35, pages 163–1223, 2022. Published version available here (open access). Previously published as a FEDEA Working Paper.
Winner of the FEDEA award "Best paper in health economics presented at the 2018 annual meeting of the Spanish Association of Health Economists by a young researcher".
Mobile Phone Signal and Economic Performance: Evidence from the Network Expansion in Myanmar (with Riccardo Ciacci and Ayesha Zainudeen).
International Migration Review, Volume 56(2), pages 594–614, 2022. Published paper available here. Updated ungated version here.
Primary Elections and Electoral Outcomes (with Riccardo Ciacci, Ana García Hernández, Laura Gismera and Antonio Nuñez Partido)
SERIES - Journal of the Spanish Economic Association, Volume 13, pages 363–396, June 2022. Published version available here (open access).
Sensitivity Matters. Comparing the Use of Multiple Indicators and of a Multidimensional Poverty Index in the Evaluation of a Poverty Eradication Program (with Edoardo Masset)
World Development, Volume 137, January 2021. Published version available here.
The Lasting Effects of Natural Disasters on Property Crime: Evidence from the 2010 Chilean Earthquake
Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, Volume 175, Pages 114-154, July 2020. Published version available here. Updated ungated version here. Previously published as an IZA Working Paper.
Aiming High and Falling Low: The SADA-Northern Ghana Millennium Village Project (with Edoardo Masset and Arnab Acharya)
Journal of Development Economics, Volume 143, March 2020. Published version available here.
The Economics of Abduction Marriage: Evidence from Ethiopia (with Lindsey Novak).
Revise and Resubmit at the Journal of Development Economics. Updated ungated version here. Previously published as an IZA Working Paper.
Police Effectiveness, Geographic Specialization, Police Organization (with Andrés Barrios-Fernández and Daniel Pérez Parra)
Under review. Published as a CEP Discussion Paper.
Disasters and Tightness of Social Norms: The Case of Female Genital Cutting (FGC) (with John Egyir and Marianna Battaglia).
Under review, Published as an IZA Discussion Paper.
Shifting the Value of Norms: Fast Internet, Premarital Sex, and the Erosion of Female Genital Mutilation (with Riccardo Ciacci and Daniel Pérez Parra).
Drat coming soon.
Neighborhood and Crime (various papers with Andrés Barrios-Fernández).
How religious leaders shape social norms (various papers with Daniel Pérez-Parra)
Fast-internet and cultural change (with Hanna Bony)
Tourism and cultural change (with Riccardo Ciacci and Daniel Pérez Parra).
A list of my pre-PhD publications, mostly in development studies and epidemiology journals, is available in my CV.