Three spheres of stratification in how social origin relates to educational achievement: a large-scale analysis

Abstract

This paper proposes to broaden the focus of analysis when studying the importance of parental context for a child’s educational achievement and attainment. Research has assessed the relevance of social origin primarily in the form of effects of parental characteristics. However, two additional aspects require further attention: first, individual-level distributions of the respective characteristics, and second, the composition or associations of context characteristics at the family level. This means that, in fact, three spheres of stratification need to be considered when assessing social origin's relevance for education. Going beyond parent-specific effects, this paper compares 61 countries with regard to the relevance of parental context in children’s educational achievement. Using large-scale data from the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2015 study, individual-level information on school students and their parents is used to derive country-specific macro-level indicators. These indicators are then used for comparative analyses. The analyses are also replicated using different measures for social origin and achievement. The results confirm that it is reasonable to consider various components when conceptualising and interpreting the level of origin-based inequality in education. There are marked international differences in the specific relevance of these components, but there are no clear associations between these dimensions.