1,720,998 research outputs found
The Impact of Truancy on Educational Attainment during Compulsory Schooling: A Bivariate Ordered Probit Estimator with Mixed Effects
No full textThis paper investigates the relationship between educational attainment in compulsory schooling and truancy. Using data from the Youth Cohort Study (YCS) of England and Wales and the Longitudinal Study of Young People in England (LSYPE), we estimate the impact of truancy on indicators of educational performance. The YCS measures both truancy and attainment as ordered responses. Our bivariate ordered probit model with mixed effects deals with both the ordered nature of the data and the potential endogeneity of truancy. In addition, it allows us to estimate the distribution of the truancy effect on educational attainment
Declining social mobility? Evidence from five linked censuses in England and Wales 1971-2011
Full text linkIn this paper we add to the existing evidence base on recent trends in inter-generational social mobility in England and Wales. We analyse data from the Office for National Statistics Longitudinal Study (ONS-LS), which links individual records from the five decennial censuses between 1971 and 2011. The ONS-LS is an excellent data resource for the study of social mobility because it has a very large sample size, excellent population coverage and low rates of nonresponse and attrition across waves. Additionally, the structure of the study means that we can observe the occupations of LS-members' parents when they were children and follow their own progress in the labour market at regular intervals into middle age. Counter to widespread prevailing beliefs, our results show evidence of a small but significant increase in social fluidity between 1950s and the 1980s for both men and women
Increasing inter-generational social mobility: is educational expansion the answer?
Full text linkReforms which increase the stock of education in a society have long been held by policy-makers as key to improving rates of intergenerational social mobility. Yet, despite the intuitive plausibility of this idea, the empirical evidence in support of an effect of educational expansion on social fluidity is both indirect and weak. In this paper we use the raising of the minimum school leaving age from 15 to 16 years in England and Wales in 1972 to estimate the effect of educational participation and qualification attainment on rates of intergenerational social class mobility. Because, in expectation, children born immediately before and after the policy was implemented are statistically exchangeable, the difference in the amount of education they received may be treated as exogenously determined. The exogenous nature of the additional education gain means that differences in rates of social mobility between cohorts affected by the reform can be treated as having been caused by the additional education. The data for the analysis come from the ONS Longitudinal Study, which links individual records from successive decennial censuses between 1971 and 2001. Our findings show that, although the reform resulted in an increase in educational attainment in the population as a whole and a weakening of the association between attainment and class origin, there was no reliably discernible increase in the rate of intergenerational social mobility
Social connectedness and generalized trust: a longitudinal perspective
Full text linkSocial, or ’generalized‘, trust refers to beliefs that people hold about how other people in society will in general act towards them. Can people in general be trusted? Or must one be careful in dealing with people? Research on the antecedents of social trust has typically relied on cross-sectional regression estimators to evaluate putative causes. Our contention is that much of this research over-estimates the importance of many of these causes because of the failure to account for unmeasured confounding influences. In this paper we use longitudinal data to assess the causal status of a particularly prominent mooted cause of trust: the degree to which individuals are socially integrated via formal membership of civic organisations and through friendship networks. We fit a range of regression estimators to repeated measures data from the UK for the period 1998 to 2008. Our results show little support for the widely held view that social trust results from integration within social networks, of either a formal or an informal natur
The effect of lifelong learning on intra-generational social mobility: evidence from longitudinal data in the United Kingdom
No full textThis research was commissioned to examine the potential non-pecuniary benefits of lifelong learning and to identify whether such benefits are evident and consider their implications for policy development. Specifically, the research aims to answer the following questions: To what extent is gaining qualifications in adulthood related to subsequent intra-generational social class mobility? Does the effect of obtaining qualifications on intra-generational social class trajectories vary by observable characteristics such as age, gender, initial qualifications and type of qualification obtained? In particular, are they larger for those with lower qualifications, those thought of as the hard to reach? Do skills improvements gained through training influence occupational status, as well as, or in addition to the achievement of formal qualifications
Are you experienced? SME use of and attitudes towards workplace mediation
No full textWorkplace mediation is high on the British policy agenda. To date, however, despite growing awareness, organisational experience in Britain remains limited and the evidence base accordingly underdeveloped. This paper contributes to the debate by undertaking secondary quantitative analysis of an Acas Omnibus Poll of 500 SMEs. Two substantive issues are explored: the characteristics associated with previous experience of mediation in resolving workplace conflict; and the extent to which prior knowledge and experience of mediation in this context impact on a range of attitudinal variables. In respect of the former we find firm size to be important, while for the latter the data suggest attitudes are typically more positive among experienced firms. This is most notably true in relation to the perceived cost of mediation and (subject to a qualification) to its suitability for smaller firms, both of which are crucial drivers of the uptake of mediation among smaller organisations
Measuring the earnings returns to accredited adult learning in the UK
Full text linkThis paper examines the earnings returns to learning that takes place following the conventional 'school-to-work' stage of the life-course. We operationalise such 'lifelong learning' as the attainment of certified qualifications in adulthood, following the completion of the first period of continuous full-time education. Using data from the British Household Panel Survey (BHPS) for the period 1991-2006, our approach and findings represent an important addition to the existing evidence base. By using annual data, we are able to employ the fixed effects estimator, which eliminates the problem of time-invariant unobserved heterogeneity. Our dynamic specification uses a lag structure to consider how earnings returns evolve in the medium and longer run, while also controlling for wage trends which were evident prior to qualification attainment. Our results show a medium-run return for women of 10% on hourly wages. For men, initial suggestions of a similar positive return are eliminated once pre-qualification trends are taken into account. This suggests that adult learning has a causal effect on women's subsequent earnings but, for men, any apparent gain is due to selection
Places and preferences: a longitudinal analysis of self-selection and contextual effects
Full text linkContextual theories of political behaviour assert that the contexts in which people live influence their political beliefs and vote choices. Most studies of political assimilation, however, rely on cross-sectional data and fail to distinguish contextual influence from self-selection of individuals into areas. This paper advances understanding of this longstanding controversy by tracking thousands of individuals over an 18-year period in England. We observe individual-level left-right position and party identification before and after residential moves across areas with different political orientations. We find evidence of both non-random selection into areas and assimilation of new entrants to the majority political orientation. However, these effects are contingent on the type of area an individual moves to and, moreover, contextual effects are weak and dominated by the larger effect of self-selection into areas
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