Collaborative Research: Resource and Stress Processes Underlying Economic Disparities in Early School Success

该项目旨在查明收入不平等影响儿童学业成功的关键过程。来自富裕家庭的孩子比来自贫困家庭的孩子有更好的学习技能，这种差异会干扰贫困儿童的教育成功，从而阻碍他们为21世纪的工作和美国的经济成功做广泛的准备。为了造福社会，这项研究将通过揭示导致儿童学业技能不平等的最具影响力的过程，促进儿童为未来做准备。为此，它将建立和测试一个概念性框架，以了解导致经济优势儿童与弱势儿童在学业技能方面存在差距的过程。这项研究对改善美国儿童和家庭的生活具有重要意义，因为它确定了干预和政策的目标，这些目标可以改善经济上处于不利地位的儿童的生活机会，并遏制日益严重的学业成绩不平等。这项研究将扩展现有的关于经济因素如何影响儿童早期学习和学术技能的知识。具体目标是(1)创建、测试和完善一个综合模型，该模型反映了将收入不平等传递给幼儿学术技能的重要背景力量；(2)利用先进的地理制图技术，结合多个国家数据源的数据；(3)使用尖端的分析技术来确定关键的家庭、学校和社区过程如何参与经济不平等与儿童不同学术技能之间的关系。该项目将结合广泛的国家行政数据来源，以及大约1.1万名儿童从婴儿期到幼儿园、1.8万名儿童从幼儿园到五年级的纵向调查和评估数据。计量经济统计分析将同时测试家庭、学校和社区的过程，以描绘影响儿童技能发展的重要因素。

This project seeks to pinpoint key processes through which income inequality influences children's academic success. Children from wealthier families have much better academic skills than do children from economically disadvantaged families, and such disparities interfere with disadvantaged children's educational success, thereby inhibiting broad preparation for 21st century jobs and American economic success. To benefit society, this study will facilitate children's preparation for the future by revealing the most impactful processes driving inequality in children's academic skills. It will do so by building and testing a conceptual framework for understanding the processes that contribute to gaps in the academic skills of economically advantaged versus disadvantaged children. The study has important implications for improving the lives of American children and families by identifying targets for interventions and policies that could improve the life chances of economically disadvantaged children and stem growing inequalities in school success. This study will expand extant knowledge of how economic factors influence children's early learning and academic skills. Specific objectives are (1) to create, test, and refine a comprehensive model of the important contextual forces that transmit income inequality to young children's academic skills; (2) to combine data from multiple national data sources using pioneering geographic mapping technologies; and (3) to use cutting-edge analytic techniques to determine how key family, school, and neighborhood processes are involved in the relationship between economic inequality and children's differing academic skills. The project will combine a broad array of national administrative data sources with longitudinal survey and assessment data on approximately 11,000 children followed from infancy through kindergarten and 18,000 children followed from kindergarten through 5th grade. Econometric statistical analyses will simultaneously test home, school, and neighborhood processes to delineate significant factors that influence the development of children's skills.