Disability and Well-being: the case of patients with acquired brain injuries (ABI) and their families

Starting date
July 1, 2017
Duration (months)
24
Departments
Economics
Managers or local contacts
Perali Federico
Keyword
disability; wellbeing; collective demand system; household public good; time use

JEL codes: D11, D63, D79, I31 e I39

Only scant and fragmented information about the economic, emotional and relational costs borne by families
hosting disabled people is available in both the Italian and international scientific literature. The project
intends to fill this gap by measuring and comparing wellbeing for the same individual before and after the
injury, within the household and across households with and without the disability using the field evidence
from a representative sample of patients with acquired brain injuries of the Verona and Florence province. The
major challenge and originality of the research is the estimation of the wellbeing of the patient and primary
family caregivers using an innovative extended demand system that incorporates household public goods,
household production, time allocations, and household technologies. Such an innovative extension is necessary
to properly understand the behavior of individuals and families with special needs and to precisely estimate
their preferences and levels of wellbeing. The research is an observational epidemiological study with a casecontrol
design because our objective is to compare wellbeing and differing needs of subjects and families who
have the acquired brain injuries (ABI) condition (the "cases") with subjects and families who do not have the
condition but are otherwise similar (the "controls").

Sponsors:

Ricerca di Base di Ateneo 2015
Funds: assigned and managed by the department

Project participants

Federico Perali
Full Professor
Research areas involved in the project
Economia del benessere e delle scelte collettive
Analysis of Collective Decision-Making
Economia del benessere e delle scelte collettive
Household Behavior and Family Economics
Economia del benessere e delle scelte collettive
Welfare and Poverty
Economia del benessere e delle scelte collettive
Welfare Economics
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