Daniel Willingham--Science & Education
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Why do rich kids do better in school than poor kids?

3/12/2012

 
The data are unequivocal: kids from wealthy families do better in school than kids from poor families. It's observable across ages, on all sorts of different measures, and (to varying degrees) in every country.

A piece I wrote for the American Educator on this phenomenon is just out. You can read it here. A very brief summary follows.

A great deal of research from the last ten years can be summarized in two broad theories.

Family Investment theories offer the intuitive idea that wealthier parents has more resources to invest in their kids, and kids, naturally enough, benefit. Financial resources can go to enrichment experiences in the summer, more books in the home, a tutor if one is needed, better access to health care, and so one.

Wealthier parents are also likely to be higher in human capital--that is, they know more stuff. Wealthier parents speak more often to their children, and with a richer vocabulary, with more complex syntax, and in a way that elicits ideas from the child. Wealthier parents are also more likely to read to their children and to buy toys that teach letters and the names of shapes and colors.

Finally, wealthier parents are more likely to be rich in social capital--that is, they are socially connected to other people how have financial, human, or social capital.

The second family of theories on this phenomenon is Stress theory.  Stress theories apply particularly to low-income families, and suggest that poverty leads to systemic stress--stress caused by crowding, by crime-ridden neighborhoods, by food uncertainty, and other factors. This stress, in turn, leads to emotional problems in parents, which leads to ineffective parenting strategies. Stress also leads directly to brain changes in children. Both of these factors lead to emotional and cognitive disadvantage for kids.  The theory is summarized in the figure.
Picture
The article elaborates on these theories in more detail and I provide citations there.

I close with this paragraph:

The research literature on the impact of socio economic status on children's learning is sobering, and it's easy to see why an individual teacher might feel helpless in the face of these effects. Teachers should not be alone in confronting the impact of poverty on children's learning. One hopes that the advances in our understanding the terrible consequences of poverty for the mind and brain will spur policymakers to serious action. but still, teachers should not despair. All children can learn, whatever their backgrounds, and whatever challenges they face.
Brad Miller
3/12/2012 10:48:52 am

This stress part is to me more of a wild card and maybe more problematic to fix, not that we are doing anywhere enough of point one. Think Wilson's (RIP)" broken widows theory" and the whole idea of character education beyond morals, some of what is now being taught in some charter schools. Two great reads are
"Sweating the Small Stuff" by David Whitman and the NYT Magazine cover story written by Paul Tough 9/14/11, "What If the Secret to Success is Failure"

http://community.nytimes.com/comments/www.nytimes.com/2011/09/18/magazine/what-if-the-secret-to-success-is-failure.html

Curmudgeon link
3/12/2012 01:23:57 pm

I think there's another possible reason: parental attitude towards education and willingness to work. A motivated, dedicated, willing-to-work parent is more likely to remain in a job and climb the corporate ladder - i.e., earn more money than the slacker parent who job-hops or keeps getting fired. The traits that serve the parent well also tend to make the child a better student. The single mother, poor for other reasons than personality type, who instills a drive in her children is the exception to the stress rule and wealthy-resources rule -- her children do well and break that cycle. The wealthy child who doesn't work does far worse than he might have.

I wrote about it here:
http://mathcurmudgeon.blogspot.com/2009/08/sat-scores-are-linked-to-family-income.html
and
http://mathcurmudgeon.blogspot.com/2009/09/response-to-income-gap-question-and.html

Bonnie Daley
3/26/2012 10:28:08 am

You are right that work-ethic is important. Also, don't forget that this is sometimes the argument against social legislation. Some immigrant parents are working two and three jobs and the stress on the family is immense. Not all people who have low-paying jobs or are unemployed are in their situation because of being a slacker.

Cal
3/13/2012 08:47:15 am

Isn't mean IQ difference a likely possibility? Obviously, stress may affect IQ in some way, but the reality is that a high IQ low income kid with tons of stress can (and often does) outperform a low IQ wealthy kid. So why do we just ignore IQ? At least, we could start to see if wealth and/or stress trumps IQ.

Daniel Willingham link
3/13/2012 09:14:37 am

@curmudgeon: this is not as easy to measure as one might think. If you administer standard attitude measures about the importance of hard work and education, everyone thinks it's important. If you want to know whether people work hard, low SES parents often work two jobs or more.

@Cal: IQ (or some proxy) is usually the first suspect that is statistically accounted for in these studies.

Cal
3/13/2012 03:28:38 pm

Are you sure? Most of the ones I've read do not account for that. Certainly the news reports don't mention it, and I didn't see anything about holding IQ or a proxy in your piece. Did I miss it?

Daniel Willingham link
3/14/2012 02:08:10 am

@Cal well in some cases, intelligence is the *outcome* measure they are trying to explain and that's well known to correlate with SES. . . . . so when researchers seek to explain othere phenomena--smaller hippocampal volume, e.g.,--they often (but not always) control for intelligence. See, for example, Hackman, Farah & Meany's reveiw article in Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 11, 651-659

kids party sydney link
5/28/2012 11:50:02 pm

i thing rich kids effort private consulting but poor kids don't have that facility.

andthen
6/27/2012 10:17:06 am

world of warcraft had great reading in it.. lol..

andthen
6/27/2012 10:18:04 am

no sometimes poor kids do better.. people poorer than me did way better..

andthen
6/27/2012 10:18:58 am

you know what never mind i'm poor.. spoiled and poor but still poor..

nobody ever used a tutor for me.. wait well maybe once.. i'm not sure..


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