Under this project, WDI is collaborating with Mathematica to support efforts by a global health organization to enable innovation across the value chain and disseminate learnings about sustainable business models in low- and middle-income markets. Supporting an ambitious learning agenda, WDI has helped develop a comprehensive MLE framework to support achievement of strategy goals for a portfolio of projects seeking to improve the nutritional status of low- and middle-income consumers in Africa and Asia. In addition, WDI has led the documentation and assessment of business model innovations tested by private sector partners and their impact through the development of comprehensive case studies and other knowledge products designed to stimulate replication of successful approaches in other markets.
Developmental evaluation (DE) was created to evaluate innovative programs that operate in complex environments and are thus expected to adapt over time. The Developmental Evaluation Pilot Activity (DEPA-MERL), developed under the U.S. Global Development Lab’s Monitoring, Evaluation, Research and Learning Innovations (MERLIN) program at the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), is testing the effectiveness of DE in the USAID context. The DEPA-MERL consortium consists of Social Impact (prime), Search for Common Ground (Search), and WDI. As part of the consortium, Social Impact and Search are implementing DEs while WDI is serving as an evaluator to assess the effectiveness of this approach in the USAID context.
In early 2020, USAID launched its first-ever Digital Strategy in order to align the Agency’s vision for development assistance with the world’s evolving digital landscape. USAID’s Innovation, Technology, and Research (ITR) Hub, formerly the U.S. Global Development Lab, is responsible for leading the strategy implementation. DEPA-MERL launched a new DE in mid-2020 to support up to four of the Strategy’s 15 implementation initiatives by providing insights into how the initiatives work within their teams and with each other as well as timely input for decision making. For the first time at USAID, the Developmental Evaluator is being embedded remotely into the initiatives due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The WDI team also conducted an analysis across the three DE pilots that occurred during the first five years of the MERLIN award. The report, Advancing the Use of Developmental Evaluation: A Summary of Key Questions Answered during a Multiyear Study of Developmental Evaluations Implemented at USAID, shares findings and lessons learned across the experiences to facilitate learning from the implementation of DE in the USAID context.
To learn more about the previous pilots or to access guidance the consortium has developed for organizations, managers, and evaluators that seek to implement the developmental evaluation approach please go here.
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (Gates Foundation) is making time-sensitive decisions for addressing challenges in primary healthcare, polio eradication and other priority areas. Light-touch research on efficiency and quality of healthcare delivery would add significant value for decision makers as they navigate a range of potential investment and implementation options. Given the quick pace and dynamic context, research should build on existing knowledge and tools, utilize small samples and rely on short feedback loops.
To address this need, WDI proposed conducting a set of discrete research activities. Each activity draws on WDI’s deep experience applying a business lens to healthcare challenges in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). The activities include:
WDI research outputs to facilitate data-driven decisions by Gates Foundation staff, grantees and government partners, leading to more efficient and effective healthcare systems, is the primary outcome of the work.
This article was originally published on NextBillion, WDI’s affiliated media site.
All too often, global development research hinges on the interest of researchers, rather than the knowledge needs of small business people and, most importantly, their impacted communities. The actual methods for data collection and analysis are also kept within the research domain, leaving an entrepreneur or small business manager with plenty of reports, but no practical tools for continuing to collect and use data themselves.
The Aspen Network of Development Entrepreneurs (ANDE), a global network working to advance emerging market entrepreneurship, recently partnered with the International Development Research Centre to support a set of partnerships explicitly designed to help small and growing businesses (SGBs) improve their own approaches to collecting and using data on gender to increase their impact. These projects were more than an exercise in changing perspectives. Instead, we collectively and purposefully attempted to “flip the script” toward empowering business owners and managers with the agency and tools to harness their data – not for the researcher’s benefit, but for their own business and community development.
As part of this process, we considered several questions relevant to SGBs that are collaborating with researchers to generate data on their work and impact. We’ll explore these questions below.
What should an SGB consider before leading an engagement with a researcher?
Before engaging with a researcher, SGBs should have a strong sense of their main goal and audience for the research. For instance, is it to inform decision-making, or to understand and share their impact? Is it to better frame their storytelling—both to inform existing stakeholders and possibly to attract new investors and/or consumers?
Often SGBs have multiple goals for data collection. While that is understandable, multiple goals can compete with one another and result in outcomes that do not fully meet any particular goal or resonate with any particular audience. A clearly articulated principal goal for data collection will help an SGB select a research partner, and set clear expectations with that partner for the type of guidance that will be most helpful in accomplishing their shared goal(s).
How relevant is a researcher’s advice to SGBs?
When an SGB leads a collaboration, researchers need to be prepared to adapt their recommendations based on the SGB’s needs and realities. While researchers may be used to applying rigorous methods in a particular way, when they place an SGB’s needs at the forefront, that approach may need adjustment. In such situations, it is helpful for the researcher to work closely with the SGB to adapt data collection to the SGB’s reality – while maintaining as much rigor as possible. While providing such guidance, researchers should explain if the adaptations will create any limitations on how the data can be used or what can be concluded from it.
For researchers’ advice to be relevant, it is also important for them to be proactive in asking questions related to the context, and to clarify any assumptions. After all, SGBs are not in the business of research, and therefore may not recognize the value of information that’s relevant to a researcher. Although SGBs are incredibly busy, it is important that their managers conduct regular meetings to provide updates and changes to the research plans. For their part, researchers should also proactively assess if and how conditions related to the research may have changed since the last conversation.
Researchers must also bring themselves closer to the areas where the SGBs work, whether that is through travel or through virtual means. Frequently, research methods are developed using desk-based work, literature and methodology review, or strategic planning sessions. But the simple act of attempting to implement these methods in the field often shatters pre-conceived notions about how realistic such methods are in the first place. Indeed, testing tools and methods before collecting data is important, as it allows researchers to adapt them to the context in order to collect useful data. For instance, in one project we supported, the team discovered a disconnect between theoretical ideas about how easily research tools could be applied, and the actual reality and context of the SGB. Recognizing this early on helped the research partners design more flexibility and validate those tools in the field.
What are some of the challenges of researcher and SGB collaborations?
Without a well-established partnership, developing a new researcher and SGB engagement will likely take more time and resources than either party expects. Both parties should anticipate spending additional time on project administration throughout the engagement.
It’s easy for things to get “lost in translation” across different national and organizational cultures. This issue is compounded when conversations involve technical language associated with research, and exacerbated when partnerships are new and communication is reliant upon e-mail, WhatsApp and other text messaging platforms. Confusion over of roles and responsibilities will almost certainly arise, much of which will not be fully anticipated. Sometimes prioritizing live voice or video calls, even when schedules are busy, can preempt or clear up misunderstandings before they solidify into conflicts.
Furthermore, when the partnership requires data collection from the local community, external researchers are unlikely to have the existing relationships and social capital of an SGB. It is important for the SGB to work with the researchers to ensure that data is collected in a way that is comfortable and respectful for community members and their cultural norms, to avoid losing trust with the community.
Are SGB-led research collaborations worth this extra effort?
Yes! These engagements can take more resources (including time), and some individuals within the SGB may not initially buy into the research process. But once the engagement concludes, most stakeholders see the value of the data gathered and are interested in continuing or even building upon the data collection processes. Indeed, in one of our projects, an SGB owner realized that the additional resources required to collect impact data from women in the coffee value chain (such as women who harvest, thresh, roast or work as baristas) yielded the added benefit of improving their understanding of these women and the challenges they face. As a result, the company (Gente del Futuro, based in Colombia) is seeking to develop new training efforts to improve the value chain. Researchers can also gain value from SGB partnerships, through field validation of their methods and being exposed to real-world implementation challenges.
How can SGBs maintain the momentum after the end of an engagement?
For busy SGBs, it can be frustrating to have piecemeal engagement with researchers on fragmented projects. To create continuity of implementation, such that researchers can further build their data collection efforts and help guide SGBs as they make decisions based on the data gathered, it is worth considering a long-term relationship with a particular research organization or individual. In order to build on the success of an engagement, researchers and SGBs can partner on the dissemination of toolkits, learnings or other project outputs through webinars or other events.
Moving research tools out of the strictly academic domain and into the hands of SGBs and other practitioners requires a spirit of patience and collaboration. But when everyone commits to the undertaking, we know the effort will lead to long-term and impactful improvement. But even more importantly, flipping the narrative and putting the power to drive research in the hands of SGBs and on-the-ground actors can enable these businesses to better meet the needs of the communities they serve.
Heather Esper is the Director of the Performance Measurement and Improvement team at the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan.
Additional contributors to this article include: Vava Angwenyi, co-Founder and Director of Gente Del Futuro; Monica Cuba, Head of Communication at Practical Action; Matthew Guttentag, Research and Impact Director at the Aspen Network of Development Entrepreneurs; and Mallory St. Claire, Impact Analyst at the Aspen Network of Development Entrepreneurs.
Photo courtesy of Gente del Futuro.
The Gender-Smart Enterprise Assistance Research Coalition (G-SEARCh) comprises a group of six like-minded impact investors: AlphaMundi Foundation, Acumen, SEAF, Root Capital, AHL Venture Partners and Shell Foundation, working to help scale purpose driven businesses and gender lens impact investing for more sustainable and inclusive economies through actionable evidence, fostering dialogue and collaboration across sectors. G-SEARCh believes that gender diverse teams lead to better financial and social outcomes and strives to build the evidence and a strong business case for investing with a gender lens that will be shared with the broader sector.
As part of this effort, the William Davidson Institute’s (WDI) Performance Measurement and Improvement team will develop and execute a robust research plan to generate evidence on improvements in financial and social performance of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) that receive gender-lens investments and incorporate gender-smart activities across their business processes. For this research, WDI will investigate the outcomes of gender-smart technical assistance (TA) provided to SMEs, using interviews and surveys to gather data with the additional goal to strengthen these interventions to generate further impact. WDI will also investigate the effectiveness of different approaches and tools that the G-SEARCh consortium’s members use to incorporate gender-smart practices across 28-30 SMEs in different regions. The research will leverage existing data gathered by investors, SMEs and implementing partners and will use participatory research approaches. Deep dives on a select group of SMEs will also collect data on a key target audience to assess the potential outcomes of gender lens investment and TA. WDI will work closely with G-SEARCh and other stakeholders in the sector to develop a gender lens investment toolkit and case studies to illustrate various interventions and analysis, and will produce a report summarizing key findings.
The goal of this research is to provide knowledge and lessons to SMEs as they seek to become more inclusive and gender-equitable, and to impact investors, as they allocate resources to gender-smart interventions and approaches so that impact investing becomes a tool for gender transformation.
Products:
We’d love to hear your feedback or answer any questions about these resources; please contact Yaquta Fatehi at <WDI-PerformanceMeasurement@umich.edu>
Consortium Members:
We are grateful for the support from our partners:
Collaborating Partner:
Many ventures struggle to capture a complete picture of what is going on inside their organization. This can be problematic for a number of reasons. It can create difficulty in demonstrating the positive socio-economic effects it promised to investors. This lack of visibility also limits a venture’s ability to better understand and address the needs of their stakeholders such as customers, producers, distributors as well as the broader community.
In this three-part webinar series, we share how managers can capture valuable data– both quantitative and qualitative– to assess their multidimensional poverty impacts. We will also discuss techniques designed for businesses that have been successfully tested and executed across many sectors and geographies by the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan (WDI) using The Base of the Pyramid Impact Assessment Framework (BoP IAF). The framework, developed by WDI Senior Research Fellow Ted London, has been featured in publications by the Harvard Business Review, the World Business Council for Sustainable Development and the Strategic Entrepreneurship Journal.
Watch Webinar 1: The Importance of Implementing Multidimensional Metrics
Guest Presenter: Julie Peachey
Key topics covered:
Watch Webinar 2: Amplifying the Voice of Local Stakeholders
Guest Presenter: Kat Harrison
Key topics covered:
Watch Webinar 3: Quantifying Changes Experienced by Local Stakeholders
Guest Presenter: Jean-Christophe Laugee
Key topics covered:
Good Business Lab (GBL) is a lab that uses research to find common ground between worker well-being and good business practices. This project focused on the go-to-market strategy for two tools GBL has developed, Pratibha and STITCH (Supervisors’ Transformation Into Change Holders) are training and assessment tools designed to help transform frontline workers to supervisors. The project provided a complete market analysis and recommendations on contracting and pricing strategies.
A worker with Chakipi Acceso Peru. Image courtesy of Chakipi.
For over 10 years, the Performance Measurement and Improvement (PMI) team at the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan has been using robust monitoring and evaluation approaches to measure results and generate value for businesses and their stakeholders.
Whether we are working with the largest network of micro-distributors in Latin America or a multi-national business in the apparel industry, our goal is to meaningfully engage our partners in the measurement and learning process. We want to make data collection valuable for participants and data findings actionable for decision-makers at all levels of a business, organization or program.
We believe such work should be shared and include practical strategies for applying research to improve performance and generate social impact. That’s why we’ve teamed up with MIT D-Lab to write a Lean Research case study, “Positive Change Through Actionable Metrics.” Lean Research is an approach to improve the practice of data collection involving people and communities in development and humanitarian contexts. (For more information on foundations of the Lean Research approach, check out this three-part blog series on NextBillion.net.
As defined by MIT D-Lab, Lean Research is driven by four principles of good research practice:
Our team’s case study covers how we followed the Lean Research approach and applied each of the four principles to our work with three separate social enterprises. Each of these businesses wanted to strengthen their ability to collect accurate data and lead their own evaluation efforts. As a result of the work, leadership from the three enterprises gained a clearer understanding of how to measure changes in the well-being of the low-income women they work with. They also learned the importance of using both business and social indicators to improve operations.
“Thanks to this process, we were able to review the way we collect data, and create a data collection manual and survey templates for each business model [we have],” said a pilot participant from Chakipi Acceso Peru, one of the businesses in our research.
So far, MIT D-Lab has produced three such cases, which you can find here. Each case describes an example of Lean Research and discusses its results and implications for development work globally. A revised version of the Lean Research Field Guide is expected to be released soon (WDI was a contributor to that work as well!)
We plan to create more cases and practical examples of how the Lean Research framework can be applied. We’re also proud to be able to contribute to what is a robust and growing community of evaluations practitioners. Indeed, we’re always looking to work with businesses that are putting Lean Research at the forefront of their measurement goals.
Want to learn more about the work mentioned in the WDI Lean Research case study? Check out the project description on our website or read the full WDI Impact Report: Positive Change Through Actionable Metrics.
Rebecca Baylor is an Evaluation Consultant with the WDI Performance Measurement and Improvement team.
“These relationships flow both ways: faculty turn to us for help in their work and we will incorporate them in specific projects we are working on. Our work increasingly integrates our expertise between sectors within WDI as well as with the expertise across the university.”
—Paul Clyde, President of WDI
WDI teams of staff and/or students worked on nearly 50 projects in more than 30 countries in 2019. Our work focused on our core consulting sectors – education, energy, finance and healthcare, as well as our management education programs, entrepreneurship development, measurement and evaluation services and the deployment of University of Michigan graduate students around the world. In the course of the year, WDI worked with faculty and researchers at the U-M Ross School of Business, the Zell Lurie Institute, Law School, the School of Public Health, the College of Engineering, the School of Nursing, the College of Literature, Science and Arts, School of Education, College of Pharmacy, Medical School, Kellogg Eye Center, School of Information, and the School of Environment and Sustainability.
“Our work capitalizes on the expertise of our staff as well as the expertise across campus,” said WDI President Paul Clyde. “Over the past 12 months we have worked with 30 faculty and many students from Ross but also students and/or faculty from a number of other schools within U-M. These relationships flow both ways: faculty turn to us for help in their work and we will incorporate them in specific projects we are working on. Our work increasingly integrates our expertise between sectors within WDI as well as with the expertise across the university.”
Here is a closer look at some highlights from 2019:
The Education consulting sector and its Entrepreneurship Development Center (EDC) continued its work on the LIFE Project, which supports refugees in Turkey as they become entrepreneurs in the food sector. In July, WDI staff members Amy Gillett and Kristin Kelterborn and faculty affiliate Eric Fretz visited the Turkish cities of Istanbul and Mersin. Watch a narrated slideshow below of their trip that details the work they did while there and the program graduates they met. Gillett and Kelterborn also wrote an article for WDI’s affiliated NextBillion website on how to accelerate the success of refugee entrepreneurs.
Building off the success of its M2GATE Program (for more on the program, watch a video below here), WDI’s Education sector is facilitating a new virtual exchange course at the U-M Ross School of Business. Read about Business & Culture: A Virtual Practicum here. And read a WDI Impact Report on virtual exchange written in March.
The Education team also delivered another successful leadership workshop for NGOs in Central and Eastern Europe. Watch an entertaining and informative video on the latest workshop here. The next NGO workshop will take place in May 2020 in Warsaw, Poland.
WDI’s Energy consulting sector, established formally in 2018, explored the hot topic of renewable mini-grids to increase energy access. Specifically, the energy team is beginning to work with local partners in the Bagladeshi village of Bagdumur to determine the viability of a mini-grid there. In early 2019, WDI also deployed graduate students from the U-M’s School for Environment and Sustainability to study how energy enterprises in India and Uganda perform and how best to document it.
WDI’s Healthcare consulting sector team members Michael Krautmann and Ben Davis traveled to Tanzania for a U.S. Agency for International Development project to help strengthen that country’s health supply chain systems. Krautmann also sat down for a Q&A about his supply chain work at WDI, and Healthcare sector faculty affiliate Ari Schwayder answered five questions about his favorite health projects to work on.
WDI’s Healthcare team also conducted a project with the Linked Foundation to inform social enterprise, med-tech, digital health, and private sector investment in Latin America. The Foundation seeks to identify market-based, impact investment opportunities specific to women’s health in Latin America, based on an integrated assessment of the major unmet needs in combination with identification of high-impact solutions and opportunities to foster the enterprise ecosystem and sustainable women’s health solutions. WDI developed an analytic methodology, conducted a landscaping study for Colombia and Peru, and will be publishing the report in January 2020. WDI and the Linked Foundation also had the opportunity to present project findings at four conference settings in the U.S. and Latin America in fall 2019. Linked anticipates this work will inform their investment strategy and catalyze additional resources to the most-needed areas in women’s health in Latin America.
WDI President Paul Clyde wrote an article exploring the profit potential for health care companies in low- and middle-income countries.
WDI Vice President for Healthcare Pascale Leroueil continued her work helping global health organizations such as Global Fund, Gavi and WHO to increase the impact of their investments.
At the beginning of 2019, WDI Vice President of Administration Claire Hogikyan traveled to Ethiopia as the first phase of work to help that country find a sustainable solution to its medical waste problem. Her trip led to the deployment of a team of Ross School graduate students a couple of months later. They developed a proposal that was presented to government officials by an organization that plans to begin operations in early 2020 of a medical waste incinerator outside Addis Ababa.
WDI’s Finance consulting sector partnered with the Ross School of Business and Professor Gautam Kaul on a first-of-its-kind curriculum-based, student-run international investment fund.
The Finance sector team also partnered with Awash Bank in Ethiopia to study a remittance program to increase peoples’ access to capital. How the program would work is explained in this infographic and in this concept note.
In 2019, the Performance Measurement & Improvement (PMI) team continued work on several ongoing projects, including whether developmental evaluation works in a USAID context and using impact data to develop strategies to increase engagement of women in Colombia’s coffee sector. PMI Senior Research Associate Rebecca Baylor also shared her views in an article exploring whether developmental evaluation is an appropriate assessment strategy.
PMI also collaborated with other WDI consulting sectors such as Education, Energy and Healthcare to provide assessment services on their projects, including evaluating the impact of the Business and Culture course. Working alongside the PMI team on that project is WDI Faculty Affiliate Andy Grogan-Kaylor. Read a Q&A about his work and why he enjoys collaborating with the PMI team.
The PMI team also attended several conference proceedings in the impact measurement field and often spoke on panels and roundtables about their work. They led several discussions at the November 2019 American Evaluation Association annual conference. After attending and moderating a discussion at a global metrics conference, Baylor wrote about what is being done to incorporate gender equality into the impact measurement space.
The past year featured several opportunities for University of Michigan students to participate in WDI-sponsored projects. In all, 76 U-M students traveled abroad for WDI work.
Occasionally, students may participate in multiple WDI-sponsored projects. To reward these hard-working, committed students, WDI established the Davidson Field Scholar program. There are currently nine students who have earned this honor.
WDI sponsored 11 Multidisciplinary Action Project (MAP) teams in 2019, and deployed five teams to five countries to study ways to improve healthcare delivery there. One MAP team member who worked in Rwanda recorded her thoughts about the project for a narrated slideshow. (See below).
And we also caught up with a couple of former students – one in South Korea and the other in India – who participated in WDI student projects to see how working on these projects impacted their career paths.
“While I knew it would serve as a useful resource, I did not realize just how helpful the Institute would be until I got to Ross and started interacting with the staff and professors associated with WDI,” Puneet Goenka, WDI alumnus said.
And as part of the WDI Global Impact Speaker Series, the Institute hosted four guest speakers – Sally Stephens of Medicines360; Tami Kesselman of Aligned Investing Global; Ujjwal Kumar of Honeywell and Efosa Ojomo of the Clayton Christensen Institute. Watch an interview with Stephens here; an interview with Kesselman here; and watch Ojomo’s talk here.
Q & A
Andy Grogan-Kaylor is a research fellow on WDI’s Performance Measurement & Improvement (PMI) team where he contributes to the research design, the design of data collection instruments and also leads the analysis of PMI projects. WDI has worked with Grogan-Kaylor since 2008, starting with a project to assess the multidimensional impact on low-income consumers of eyeglasses. He contributed to a series of WDI-led impact assessment workshops, and worked with PMI on a project measuring the impact of formal sector employment with training and benefits targeting low-income women in Mexico City. He currently is working with PMI to assess the impact of an innovative virtual exchange course with students in the U.S. and MENA regions.
Andy Grogan-Kaylor: There are probably two big reasons in my background that I became interested in this kind of work. First of all, I grew up in Madison, Wisconsin, home to the University of Wisconsin, which has a longstanding tradition of working on international research and international development. Many of my friends’ parents did international work, and I suppose that influenced me from very early on. Second, after I completed my undergraduate degree, I had the opportunity to serve as a Peace Corps volunteer, living and working for two years in the Upper East Region of Ghana. That experience only deepened my interest in, and commitment to, international and development work.
Grogan-Kaylor: By chance really. A graduate student who was working with WDI, but also getting a degree in the School of Social Work, stopped by my office to ask some methodological questions. That conversation led to a larger conversation about the kind of projects that WDI works on. I expressed a lot of interest in the work of WDI. One thing led to another, and I’ve been lucky enough to work with the great WDI Performance Measurement and Improvement team for about a decade on a number of projects.
“WDI’s PMI team is one of the most talented, most collaborative and most friendly teams I have ever had the pleasure to work with. So I’m always grateful for the opportunity to collaborate with them on problems and issues where the direct real world application is very clear.”
—Andy Grogan-Kaylor
Grogan-Kaylor: I always try to work on social issues that have real world applications. But a lot of my research (which I still consider very valuable) is more “basic science” – trying to understand the interplay of parenting and child development across cultures (e.g. here and here). While this has been my primary focus, I also have done some work in pretty eclectic and diverse areas. And I can be convinced to work on almost any kind of program evaluation or social research problem if I’m working with bright, talented, friendly people. WDI’s PMI team is one of the most talented, most collaborative and most friendly teams I have ever had the pleasure to work with. So I’m always grateful for the opportunity to collaborate with them on problems and issues where the direct real world application is very clear.
Grogan-Kaylor: A lot of the work that I do is trying to understand how family and parenting processes play out. For example, I’ve done a lot of work on the effects of physical punishment, conducting research that shows that physical punishment has an undesirable effect on child behavior and child mental health. That kind of research is very important, and can ultimately have an effect on programs and policies, but it can take a long time. Every project I’ve worked on with WDI has been an evaluation of the effects of a particular program, or in the case of the Business and Culture Impact Assessment, a course, so the real world application is a lot more clear.
Grogan-Kaylor: I think that we all have that “inner voice” that tells us what we are passionate about, or the social problems that we are motivated to work on. I try to tell all of the graduate students with whom I work to try to stay true to those ideas and issues that you feel passionate about. Academic work on social issues and social problems is very, very challenging, and takes a lot of hard work. To keep moving forward, you need to stay true to that voice inside you that tells you what are the most pressing issues that you in particular feel called to work upon.
Grogan-Kaylor also is a professor of Social Work at the University of Michigan’s School of Social Work. His current research focuses on the way in which parenting behaviors, like the use of physical punishment, or parental expressions of emotional warmth, have an effect on child outcomes like aggression, antisocial behavior, anxiety and depression, and how these dynamics play out across contexts, neighborhoods, and cultures.