Family and educational outcomes for youth

Numerous studies have found linkage between quality of parents’ relationship and positive outcomes for children. While, most of these findings come from the developed countries, there are a few from developing world that examines the association between parental relationship and youth development. Many of these studies, especially in Indian context, have considered health as an indicator of development. Yet very little research has examined whether this association holds good for other development indicators, for example schooling. Moreover, whether the association varies across various population subgroups, especially among men and women? Drawing on the data from a sub-nationally youth representative study in India, this paper examines how parent-child relation and parental characteristics contribute in better school performance such as school continuation, completion of age-appropriate level of schooling, successful completion of the last class and regular class attendance. Analyses focus on more than 11,000 unmarried men and 17,000 unmarried women aged 15-24 years. Results indicate that the parents’ relationship quality is very consistently and positively associated with a range of schooling outcomes. This association holds for both unmarried young men and women participated in study at national and sub-national levels.

The objective of this study is to evaluate the impact of receiving Bolsa Familia Program (BFP) on the school performance of Brazilian children and adolescents in different age groups and in different regions of the country. The BFP, created in 2003, benefits about 13 million families in poverty and extreme poverty through direct transfer of income. One of the conditions to receive the benefit is that children between 6 and 17 years old attend schools regularly. The data comes from two sources: an evaluation of the Center for Public Policy and Education Evaluation (CAEd) applied to students in public education and the National Household Sample Survey (PNAD) conducted by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) both in 2011. After a simulation to estimate the beneficiary families in PNAD, the methodology employed is the Propensity Score Matching that allows comparison of beneficiary families with not beneficiaries ones whose observable characteristics are similar. The results illustrate, by some indicators, the impact of Bolsa Família on the school performance of children and adolescents after nine years of program deployment.

The human capital is defined as knowledge, skills, and other abilities which will lead to improvement in the quality and level of production. The capital achieved at younger ages would have stronger effects on the progress at later ages. Family has shown to have crucial influence on the achievement. Iranian families are now experiencing a low level fertility, highly educated parents, and a relatively high level of family dissolution. Using data drawn from the Time Use Survey (conducted during 2008-2009), this paper aims to examine the effects of the number of children on the achievement of human capital by young children in urban areas of Iran. Target population includes 2183 never-married children aged 15-19 years. Findings show a negative relationship between the number of children and the achievement of human capital. A sharper difference exists between families with one or two children and families with 3 and more children. Multivariate analyses show the significant effects of the sex and age of children, and the mother's level of education. The presence of such control variables, however, does not change the effect of number of children. The results can show the sustainability of low family size (two-child family) in future.

This study examines the reasons for the gap in educational attainment between children from intact and non-intact families. Though parental involvement and socioeconomic resources are well-established reasons, these factors do not explain the entire relationship between family structure and educational trajectories. This study considers whether school engagement is another major explanation for the comparatively lower educational attainment of adolescents from non-intact families. The analysis follows a cohort (born 1984) from age 15 to 26 and compares their chances of university enrolment and completion. The regression analysis demonstrates that school engagement is indeed an important reason for the lower educational attainment of adolescents from non-intact families. Moreover, the decomposition analysis demonstrates that school engagement is the primary explanation for the gap in educational attainment between adolescents from different family types. School engagement explains a greater proportion of this gap than the combined influence of parental involvement, parental education, and household income.