Cognitive skills, non-cognitive skills, and family background: evidence from sibling correlations

Silke Anger and Daniel Schnitzlein

Journal of Population Economics, 2017, vol. 30, issue 2, No 7, 620 pages

Abstract: Abstract This paper estimates sibling correlations in cognitive and non-cognitive skills to evaluate the importance of family background for skill formation. Based on a large representative German dataset including IQ test scores and measures of non-cognitive skills, a restricted maximum likelihood model indicates a strong relationship between family background and skill formation. Sibling correlations in non-cognitive skills range from 0.22 to 0.46; therefore, at least one-fifth of the variance in these skills results from shared sibling-related factors. Sibling correlations in cognitive skills are higher than 0.50; therefore, more than half of the inequality in cognition can be explained by shared family background. Comparing these findings with those in the intergenerational skill transmission literature suggests that intergenerational correlations capture only part of the influence of family on children’s cognitive and non-cognitive skills, as confirmed by decomposition analyses and in line with previous findings on educational and income mobility.

Keywords: Sibling correlations; Family background; Non-cognitive skills; Cognitive skills; Intergenerational mobility (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J24 J62 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (33)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s00148-016-0625-9 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
Working Paper: Cognitive Skills, Non-Cognitive Skills, and Family Background: Evidence from Sibling Correlations (2016)
Working Paper: Cognitive skills, non-cognitive skills, and family background: evidence from sibling correlations (2016)
Working Paper: Cognitive Skills, Non-Cognitive Skills, and Family Background: Evidence from Sibling Correlations (2016)
Working Paper: Cognitive skills, non-cognitive skills, and family background: Evidence from sibling correlations (2016)
Working Paper: Cognitive Skills, Non-Cognitive Skills, and Family Background: Evidence from Sibling Correlations (2015)
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:spr:jopoec:v:30:y:2017:i:2:d:10.1007_s00148-016-0625-9

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer. ... tion/journal/148/PS2

DOI: 10.1007/s00148-016-0625-9

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Population Economics is currently edited by K.F. Zimmermann

More articles in Journal of Population Economics from Springer, European Society for Population Economics Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().