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on Education |
| By: | TANAKA Ryuichi; WANG Tong |
| Abstract: | This paper studies the effect of class-size reduction on students’ academic outcomes with a special focus on its heterogeneity based on classmates’ characteristics. We estimate the causal effects of class-size reduction on students’ mathematics and language test scores, controlling student-teacher fixed effects and applying the predicted class size with a cap as an instrument for the actual class size. Using rich panel data on Japanese primary school students, we find that the average effect of class size reduction is positive and robust for math test scores and that classes with high-ability classmates benefit even more from class size reduction. We find that the effect of class size reduction depends positively on the ability of the student with the lowest rank in a class. In addition, we find that classes with a high share of female students benefit more from class size reduction. Our findings provide strong support for the theoretical framework of Lazear (2001). |
| Date: | 2024–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:eti:dpaper:24004&r=edu |
| By: | Federica Braccioli; Paolo Ghinetti; Simone Moriconi; Constanza Naguib; Michelle Pellizzari |
| Abstract: | We study the choice of acquiring STEM college education using variation induced by the proximity to universities offering different types of programs. We adopt the methodology by Heckman and Pinto (2018) allowing the identification of the distribution of response types and treatment effects with multiple unordered choices. We combine survey data for Italy with historical information about the founding dates of all universities and faculties. We find that most compliers are women at the margin of choosing STEM education versus not going to college. Expanding the supply of STEM education could reduce the gender gap in STEM by 20%. |
| Keywords: | monotonicity, returns to education, STEM, Instrumental Variables |
| JEL: | I23 I26 I28 J31 |
| Date: | 2024–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bge:wpaper:1419&r=edu |
| By: | Paul Bingley; Lorenzo Cappellari; Marco Ovidi |
| Abstract: | We investigate the stages of childhood at which parental job loss is most consequential for their child’s education. Using Danish administrative data linking parents experiencing plant closures to their children, we compare end-of-school outcomes to matched peers and to closures hitting after school completion age. Parental job loss disproportionally reduces test taking, scores, and high school enrolment among children exposed during infancy (age 0-1). Effects are largest for low-income families and low-achieving children. The causal chain from job loss to education likely works through reduced family income. Maternal time investment partially offsets the effect of reduced income |
| Keywords: | Parental labor market shocks; Intergenerational mobility; Child development |
| JEL: | D10 J13 |
| Date: | 2023–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:irs:cepswp:2023-12&r=edu |
| By: | Ningyi Li |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the effects of daily exercise time on the academic performance of junior high school students in China, with an attempt to figure out the most appropriate daily exercise time for students from the perspective of improving students' test scores. By dividing the daily exercise time into five sections to construct a categorical variable in a linear regression model as well as using another model to draw intuitive figures, I find that spending both too little and too much time on physical activity every day would have adverse impacts on students' academic performance, with differences existing in the impacts by gender, grade, city scale, and location type of the school. The findings of this paper carry implications for research, school health and education policy and physical and general education practice. The results also provide recommendations for students, parents and teachers. |
| Date: | 2023–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2312.11484&r=edu |
| By: | Nicole Stoelinga (Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods, Bonn) |
| Abstract: | This study shows that civilians’ behavior can be severely affected by territorial control by an insurgent group, and that these effects can persist after the government regains control and the occupation ends. I consider a framework of civilian behavior under insurgent rule, where civilians have the option to cooperate with, or resist, rules imposed by insurgents. I exploit the temporary occupation of territory in Nigeria by Boko Haram, an insurgent group with a strong anti-educational stance, as a quasi-experiment. Behavior is measured through school participation among children. Using individual-level panel data, I compare children exposed to the insurgency with children exposed to both the insurgency and occupation. The main results show (i) an immediate, negative effect on school participation, especially for those sharing a social identity with the insurgents, exposed to violent rule enforcement, and facing social pressure to conform, (ii) these negative effects persist in the long-run for the first and second group only. The effects cannot be explained by well-documented mechanisms linking conflict to lower school participation, demonstrating the need to account for occupation, and not solely violence, when considering the impact of insurgencies on civilians. |
| Keywords: | conflict, insurgency, rebel governance, education, development |
| JEL: | I24 D74 O10 |
| Date: | 2024–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mpg:wpaper:2024_03&r=edu |
| By: | Patricia Cortés; Ying Feng; Nicolás Guida-Johnson; Jessica Pan |
| Abstract: | We examine the differential effects of automation on the labor market and educational outcomes of women relative to men over the past four decades. Although women were disproportionately employed in occupations with a high risk of automation in 1980, they were more likely to shift to high-skill, high-wage occupations than men in over time. We provide a causal link by exploiting variation in local labor market exposure to automation attributable to historical differences in local industry structure. For a given change in the exposure to automation across commuting zones, women were more likely than men to shift out of routine task-intensive occupations to high-skill, high wage occupations over the subsequent decade. The net effect is that initially routine-intensive local labor markets experienced greater occupational gender integration. College attainment among younger workers, particularly women, also rose significantly more in areas more exposed to automation. We propose a model of occupational choice with endogenous skill investments, where social skills and routine tasks are q-complements, and women have a comparative advantage in social skills, to explain the observed patterns. Supporting the model mechanisms, areas with greater exposure to automation experienced a greater movement of women into occupations with high social skill (and high cognitive) requirements than men. |
| JEL: | J16 J24 |
| Date: | 2024–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:32030&r=edu |
| By: | Eva M. Berger (Federal Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs); Ernst Fehr (University of Zurich); Henning Hermes (ifo Institute Munich); Daniel Schunk (Johannes Gutenberg University); Kirsten Winkel (University of Koblenz) |
| Abstract: | Working memory capacity is a key component of executive functioning and is thought to play an important role for a wide range of cognitive and noncognitive skills such as fluid intelligence, math, reading, the inhibition of pre-potent impulses or more general self-regulation abilities. Because these abilities substantially affect individuals’ life trajectories in terms of health, education, and earnings, the question of whether working memory (WM) training can improve them is of considerable importance. However, whether WM training leads to spillover effects on these other skills is contested. Here, we examine the causal impact of WM training embedded in regular school teaching by a randomized educational intervention involving a sample of 6–7 years old first graders. We find substantial immediate and lasting gains in working memory capacity. In addition, we document positive spillover effects on geometry, Raven’s fluid IQ measure, and the ability to inhibit pre-potent impulses. Moreover, these spillover effects emerge over time and only become fully visible after 12–13 months. Finally, we document that three years after the intervention the children who received training have a roughly 16 percentage points higher probability of entering the academic track in secondary school. |
| Date: | 2024–01–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:jgu:wpaper:2402&r=edu |
| By: | Gerardo Sabater-Grande (LEE and Department of Economics, Universitat Jaume I, Castellón, Spain); Noemí Herranz-Zarzoso (Department of Economic Analysis, Universitat de València, Spain); Aurora García-Gallego (LEE & Economics Department, Universitat Jaume I, Castellón-Spain) |
| Abstract: | We analyze the effectiveness of monetary incentives and/or feedback in order to improve students’ calibration of academic performance. A randomized field experiment is implemented in which undergraduate students enrolled in a Microeconomics course are offered the possibility to judge their academic performance immediately before (prediction) and after (postdiction) completing each of the three exam-multiple choice tests of their continuous evaluation. Potential (actual) miscalibration in each test is calculated as the difference between the predicted (post-dicted) grade and the actual grade. The treatment variables are monetary incentives and individual feedback since they may potentially affect students’ judgment accuracy. Different treatments allow for the analysis of the effect of one of the variables alone or the joint effect of introducing the two variables. The main result is that potential and actual miscalibration are independent of the treatment variables. Our data analysis controls for confounding factors like students’ cognitive ability, academic record, risk attitudes and personality traits. Our data reflect that students’ potential miscalibration is significantly reduced in subsequent tests to the first, only in the treatment where individual feedback as well as monetary incentives are provided. |
| Keywords: | calibration of academic performance, monetary incentives, feedback, prediction, post-diction |
| JEL: | C93 D03 |
| Date: | 2024 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:jau:wpaper:2024/01&r=edu |