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Non-cognitive Skills and the Quality of Early Education: Four Essays in Applied Microeconomics

Externe Monographien

Georg F. Camehl

Berlin: FU Berlin, 2018, 162, XLII S.

Abstract

This dissertation consists of four independent chapters which contribute to the economic analysis of non-cognitive skills and the quality of education. These chapters are preceded by a comprehensive introduction that motivates the individual research questions and indicates common and complementary contributions of the four main chapters. The chapters are followed by a conclusion that discusses potential limitations, points towards open research questions and makes policy recommendations based on the results of this dissertation. Chapter 2 evaluates how the Positive Parenting Program (Triple P) affects maternal well-being. The program aims at positively influencing child outcomes by improving parenting skills. The chapter evaluates a randomized controlled trial (RCT) of Triple P. Additionally, it analyzes a separate sample of mothers from a deprived neighborhood who received the treatment, but for whom no control group was recruited. For the sample without a control group, an additional control group using survey data from the German Socio-Economic Panel study (SOEP) is generated. This control group is then used to estimate the effect of Triple P on maternal well-being by applying entropy balancing matching. Overall, the chapter shows positive effects of Triple P on maternal well-being - with the largest effects appearing three years after treatment. It illustrates that maternal well-being can be affected through a parenting program as an example of an early childhood intervention that, consequently, benefits families. Chapter 3 empirically investigates information asymmetries between parents and early childhood education and care (ECEC) professionals in German childcare institutions. It specifically analyzes the relationships between parental socioeconomic status (SES), ECEC institution characteristics, and quality assessments of childcare centers given by parents and educators. The chapter uses K2ID-SOEP, a unique extension of the SOEP providing nationally representative data on quality assessments of parents on the childcare center their children attend. In addition, educators and center managers from these same centers provided quality assessments. Utilizing both descriptive and correlational methods, the chapter compares quality perceptions by parents and by professionals across 734 ECEC centers. The chapter describes the construction of an index for information gaps for the different quality features and uses logistic regressions to relate these to demand (i.e. parental) and supply (i.e. ECEC center) characteristics. The chapter shows that considerable information asymmetries between parents and educators exist. These differ substantially across quality measures but less so by parental socioeconomic background or center characteristics. Both of these aspects contribute to explaining variations in the information gaps to a similar degree. Chapter 4 investigates the causal effects of quality features of the ECEC group a child attends on prosocial behavior and personality traits. The analyses are based on the German National Educational Panel Study (NEPS), a large-scale survey dataset focusing on educational trajectories. Prosocial behavior and personality traits of children are assessed at age five by their parents. The analyses use within-center variation in quality of ECEC-groups to identify the causal effect of quality on these specific child non-cognitive skills. While selectivity may be a threat to identification, evidence from specification tests suggests that, in the German context, differences in quality between groups can be considered exogenous to the parents. This chapter provides evidence that the availability of educational and playing materials in the group have a positive effect on prosocial behavior. This result is robust to a number of robustness tests. Chapter 5 analyzes whether, and to what extent, personality traits are malleable over a time span of eight years for a sample of working individuals. Specifically, it looks at changes in personality traits after a major adverse life event: involuntary job loss. The chapter uses data from the SOEP from 2004 to 2014 - a period over which individuals' personality traits were measured three times. The dataset allows to exploit detailed employment information, particularly reasons for job termination and unemployment spells. The chapter focuses solely on plant closures as a reason for job termination. The results of the chapter suggest that to some extent personality traits are indeed malleable during adulthood. Although personality traits are relatively stable within the population of workers, the chapter finds an increase in openness, that is, the willingness to seek new experiences, for the average displaced worker. This increase, however, is fully driven by individuals with high educational attainment and by those who find a new job immediately after dismissal.



Keywords: Early Childhood Education and Care, Quality, Non-cognitive Skills
Externer Link:
https://refubium.fu-berlin.de/bitstream/handle/fub188/22722/Dissertation_Georg_Camehl_UB.pdf?sequence=3&isAllowed=y

Frei zugängliche Version: (pi)
http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:188-refubium-22722-0

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