Abstract: This paper evaluates the relationship between parental education and children’s cognitive and non-cognitive abilities. The relationship is explored using the 1970 British Cohort Study data in a standard Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) model. Unlike previous studies, the dataset applied enables me to account for parental ability, which was assessed when the individuals were ten years old. My results show a positive effect of parental education before controlling for parental ability. However, after controlling for ability, the effects of parental education decrease and become partly insignificant. A possible interpretation might be that "formal" education does not fully encompass how parental education influences transmission. The results are similar for non-cognitive abilities and robust to a different econometric specification. Additionally, conducting a mediation analysis, my results suggest that a substantial part is transmitted via environmental factors children are experiencing.
(joint with Katrin Demmelhuber, Florian Englmaier, Felix Leiss, Sascha Möhrle und Andreas Peichl)
ifo Schnelldienst (2021), 74(3), 33-37