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The role of parental investments for cognitive and noncognitive skill formation: Evidence for the first 11 years of life

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  • Coneus, Katja
  • Laucht, Manfred
  • Reuß, Karsten

Abstract

This paper examines the impact of parental investments on the development of cognitive, mental and emotional skills during childhood using data from a longitudinal study, the Mannheim Study of Children at Risk, starting at birth. Our work offers three important innovations. First, we use reliable measures of the child's cognitive, mental and emotional skills as well as accurate measures of parental investment. Second, we estimate latent factor models to account for unobserved characteristics of children. Third, we examine the skill development for girls and boys separately, as well as for children who were born with either organic or psychosocial risk. We find a decreasing impact of parental investments on cognitive and mental skills, while emotional skills seem to be unaffected by parental investment throughout childhood. Thus, initial inequality persists during childhood. Since families are the main sources of education during the first years of life, our results have important implications for the quality of the parent-child relationship.

Suggested Citation

  • Coneus, Katja & Laucht, Manfred & Reuß, Karsten, 2010. "The role of parental investments for cognitive and noncognitive skill formation: Evidence for the first 11 years of life," ZEW Discussion Papers 10-028, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research.
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:zewdip:10028
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    References listed on IDEAS

    as
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    cognitive skills; noncognitive skills; critical and sensitive periods; self-productivity; inequality; organic risk; psychosocial risk;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I12 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health Behavior
    • I21 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Analysis of Education
    • J13 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Fertility; Family Planning; Child Care; Children; Youth

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