Introduction
outcomes will differ depending on the combinations of circumstances and risk
experienced by the child.
1.5.5 The problem of identifying policy implications - education is not
the only thing that matters
Thus, education does not act on inter-generational transmission in isolation from other
factors. This report lays out the mechanisms for the effects of a host of distal and
proximal factors on child development and focuses on them in part as channels for
effects of education. This is not to suggest that these other factors do not have
importance independently of education. Education may impact on income and so
some of the effect of income may be thought of as the channelling of the effect of
education but that is not to subsume the whole income effect under the heading of
education. A large component of family income is independent of parents’ education
and even to the extent that income mediates the effect of education this can still be
conceptualised as an income effect. In policy terms it may be that an increment to
income is a more effective policy tool than attempted increments to education even if
income mediates education effects. We return to these important issues in the
conclusions.
However, even conditioning on income, empirical investigations tend to find that the
effect of parental education on children’s attainments is at least as great as the effect
of income. Our aim is not to denigrate the significance of income but to support a
more balanced view that recognises that many factors are important in the
development of ability. We also highlight the value of the ecological framework as a
structure for assessing the interactions between the different factors and assessing the
relative importance of each.
We have also hypothesised that education is a key moderator of the effect of each
individual factor. However, we recognise that there are other important moderating
factors. Education changes the way family resources impact on children but so do
ethnicity and class. Resources may be allocated in different ways for boys and girls.
These moderating effects may apply to all of the factors that impact on attainment so
that the whole model of effects may be different for children of different ethnicities,
class backgrounds or gender.
This model is put forward here as an aid to policy makers in better understanding the
mechanisms for the inter-generational effects of education. However, the focus on
education should not be taken for the claim that education is the only important factor
or the only factor with such wide-ranging influences. That is certainly not the claim
being made here.
1.5.6 Dynamic modelling and the agency of children
Children are themselves important determinants of their own academic and
psychological development. The static model presented in this paper ignores these
dynamic elements and so neglects somewhat the agency and resilience of children. It
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