How Does Socio-Economic Status Shape a Child's Personality?

Hannah Schildberg-Hörisch, Thomas Deckers, Armin Falk and Fabian Kosse
Authors registered in the RePEc Author Service: Hannah Schildberg-Hoerisch ()

VfS Annual Conference 2014 (Hamburg): Evidence-based Economic Policy from Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association

Abstract: We show that parental socioeconomic status (SES) is a powerful predictor of many facets of a child's personality. The facets of personality we investigate encompass time preferences, risk preferences, and altruism that are important noncognitive skills, as well as crystallized, fluid, and overall IQ that represent cognitive skills. We measure parental SES by the mother's and father's average years of education and household income. Our results show that children from families with higher SES are more patient, less likely to be risk-seeking, and score higher on IQ tests. About 20 to 40% of this relationship can be explained by dimensions of a child's environment that are shown to di ffer by parental SES: quantity and quality of time parents spend with their children, parenting style, the mother's IQ and economic preferences, a child's initial conditions at birth, and family structure. Personality profiles that vary systematically with parental SES off er an explanation for social immobility.

JEL-codes: C91 J13 J24 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cbe, nep-evo and nep-neu
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/100285/1/VfS_2014_pid_63.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: How Does Socio-Economic Status Shape a Child's Personality? (2016)
Working Paper: How Does Socio-Economic Status Shape a Child's Personality? (2015)
Working Paper: How Does Socio-Economic Status Shape a Child's Personality? (2015)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:zbw:vfsc14:100285

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