Parental socioeconomic status and children’s academic achievement: longitudinal evidence from Ethiopia, India, Peru and Vietnam

Vandemoortele, Milagros (2024) Parental socioeconomic status and children’s academic achievement: longitudinal evidence from Ethiopia, India, Peru and Vietnam. PhD thesis, London School of Economics and Political Science.

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Abstract

For decades academics have tried to understand why children from less advantaged households perform worse than those from more advantaged ones. The evidence from high-income countries shows that the socioeconomic status (SES) of parents is a critically important predictor of children’s academic achievement. There is little longitudinal evidence on the association between parental SES and children’s academic achievement among low- and middle-income countries. This is partly due to the limited availability of relevant and reliable data. I use the Young Lives dataset which, in each of four low- and middle-income countries, follows 2,000 children from 1 year old to 15 years old. These countries are Ethiopia, India, Peru and Vietnam. With this thesis I am adding to low- and middle-income country literature what has been done to high-income country literature. First, I document SES gaps in achievement that cover the age range of 5 to 15 years old (which existing studies do not cover). Second, I examine children’s trajectories in their achievement, based on their initial SES and achievement scores. Third, because early childhood education (ECE) is often promoted as an effective strategy to reduce SES gaps in achievement, I examine whether ECE is associated with gains in achievement across childhood (over and above the association with parental SES). While I expected to obtain very different results across the countries given their distinct levels of development and diverse contexts, the findings on SES gaps in achievement and the achievement trajectories by SES, are remarkably similar, not only to each other but also to those in high-income countries. When I examine whether ECE is associated with gains in achievement across childhood my findings differ at early ages, as I expected, given distinct ECE systems across countries. However, by the age of 15 years the findings are consistent across countries.

Item Type:	Thesis (PhD)
Additional Information:	© 2024 Milagros Vandemoortele
Library of Congress subject classification:	H Social Sciences > HC Economic History and Conditions H Social Sciences > HN Social history and conditions. Social problems. Social reform H Social Sciences > HQ The family. Marriage. Woman L Education > L Education (General)
Sets:	Departments > Social Policy
Supervisor:	Jenkins, Stephen P. and Stewart, Kitty
URI:	http://etheses.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/4652

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