Strategic Parenting, Birth Order and School Performance

V. Joseph Hotz and Juan Pantano ()
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Juan Pantano: Washington University, St. Louis

No 7680, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: Fueled by new evidence, there has been renewed interest about the effects of birth order on human capital accumulation. The underlying causal mechanisms for such effects remain unsettled. We consider a model in which parents impose more stringent disciplinary environments in response to their earlier-born children's poor performance in school in order to deter such outcomes for their later-born offspring. We provide robust empirical evidence that school performance of children in the NLSY-C declines with birth order as does the stringency of their parents' disciplinary restrictions. And, when asked how they will respond if a child brought home bad grades, parents state that they would be less likely to punish their later-born children. Taken together, these patterns are consistent with a reputation model of strategic parenting.

Keywords: birth order; school performance; grades; parenting; parental rules (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I20 J1 J13 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 25 pages
Date: 2013-10
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (16)

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Related works:
Journal Article: Strategic parenting, birth order, and school performance (2015)
Working Paper: Strategic Parenting, Birth Order and School Performance (2013)
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