The Effect of Birth Order on Development and Attainment

出生顺序对发展和成就的影响

• 批准号: 6758192
• 负责人: FRANK HEILAND
• 金额: $ 7.08万
• 依托单位: FLORIDA STATE UNIVERSITY
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 财政年份: 2004
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2004-09-01 至 2006-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/6758192
• 关键词: academic achievement; behavioral /social science research tag; child behavior; child psychology; clinical research; cognition; early experience; human data; learning; longitudinal human study; low socioeconomic status; racial /ethnic difference; sibling order

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Numerous studies have addressed the role of birth order on cognitive ability measures but to date little consensus has emerged. Most of the existing evidence of a negative relationship between birth order and child cognitive development and achievement is based on conventional regression analysis using cross-sectional data. In particular, no research has investigated the effect of birth order on the development of young children using large sibling samples. I propose to investigate the role of birth order on child development and scholastic achievement using better data and methods. I will also assess the role of ultimately completed family size and how it relates to the effect of birth order on child development. Specifically, I will investigate whether (1) children who are late in the birth order face elevated risks of adverse developmental and scholastic outcomes, (2) the birth order effect is causal or the result of spurious correlation, (3) there is an independent effect of ultimately completed family size on development, (4) the birth order and completed family size effects differ for minority and low-income families, (5) the effect of birth order on behavioral development differs from its effect on cognitive development, (6) the birth order, completed family size, and sibling spacing have long-term effects on scholastic attainment. In order to study these issues I use mother-child data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 (NLSY79) and data on the educational attainment of young adults from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID). These large nationally representative longitudinal surveys that over sample minorities provide good measures of the socio-economic conditions and family size during childhood and a rich set of measures of cognitive and behavioral development and scholastic achievement. The NLSY79 data are used to explore the effects of birth order on developmental outcomes during childhood. Longer-term effects of birth order on attainment are investigated using schooling data from the PSID. With larger and more representative samples, the proposed empirical models can properly identify the effect of birth order and complete family size effects on child achievements.

描述（由申请人提供）：许多研究已经解决了出生顺序在认知能力测量中的作用，但迄今为止还没有达成共识。大多数关于出生顺序与儿童认知发展和成就之间负相关的现有证据是基于使用横截面数据的传统回归分析。特别是，还没有研究使用大量的兄弟姐妹样本来调查出生顺序对幼儿发展的影响。我建议使用更好的数据和方法来调查出生顺序对儿童发展和学业成就的作用。我还将评估最终完成的家庭规模的作用，以及它与出生顺序对儿童发展的影响之间的关系。具体来说，我将调查(1)出生顺序较晚的儿童是否面临不良发展和学业结果的高风险，(2)出生顺序效应是因果关系还是伪相关的结果，(3)最终完成的家庭规模对发展有独立的影响，(4)出生顺序和完成的家庭规模效应在少数民族和低收入家庭中有所不同。(5)出生顺序对行为发展的影响不同于对认知发展的影响；(6)出生顺序、完整家庭规模和兄弟姐妹间隔对学业成绩有长期影响。为了研究这些问题，我使用了1979年全国青年纵向调查（NLSY79）的母子数据和收入动态小组研究（PSID）中年轻人受教育程度的数据。这些具有全国代表性的大型纵向调查提供了对儿童时期社会经济条件和家庭规模的良好衡量标准，以及对认知和行为发展以及学业成就的丰富衡量标准。NLSY79数据用于探索出生顺序对儿童时期发育结果的影响。出生顺序对学业成就的长期影响使用来自PSID的学校数据进行了调查。所提出的实证模型样本量更大、更具代表性，能够较好地识别出生顺序和完整家庭规模对儿童成就的影响。