A longitudinal mixed methods study of parents’ socioeconomic status and children’s educational attainment in Dalian City, China

Sung won Kim, Edward J. Kim, Amy Wagaman and Vanessa L. Fong

International Journal of Educational Development, 2017, vol. 52, issue C, 111-121

Abstract: This article examines why most of a cohort that attended eighth or ninth grade in 1999 at a middle school in Dalian City, Liaoning Province, China believed by 2012–2013 that children of poorer parents did better academically than children of wealthier parents. Based on survey data collected from 503 members of this cohort in 1999 and 2012–13, we found that business owners were the wealthiest among respondents' parents, that children of business owner mothers were less likely to get into a prestigious college prep high school and attain a bachelor's degree than children of white-collar mothers, and that children of blue-collar fathers were more likely than children of white-collar fathers to get into a prestigious high school and obtain a bachelor's degree. Based on follow-up interviews with 48 of these respondents, we found that business owning parents had less time than other parents to tutor their children, and that children of “poorer” parents were more motivated than children of “wealthier” parents (most of whom were business owners) to gain upward mobility through academic achievement.

Keywords: Education; China; Urbanization; Occupation; Social stratification; Achievement (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0738059316303674
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:injoed:v:52:y:2017:i:c:p:111-121

DOI: 10.1016/j.ijedudev.2016.10.007

Access Statistics for this article

International Journal of Educational Development is currently edited by Stephen P Heyneman

More articles in International Journal of Educational Development from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().