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Characteristics of the family

There is less evidence on the specific importance of characteristics of contexts for
development than on the importance of distal factors or proximal processes because
much of the literature concerned with contexts does so as part of more complex
modelling about the links between distal factors and subsequent child development.
Therefore this section is largely grounded in theory, drawing on evidence where it is
available. Evidence based on more complex modelling of distal factors operating
through the characteristics of a given context on development will be discussed in our
conclusions in section 7.

Resources

The expenditure of resources of goods and time is the mechanism by which distal
factors such as income, family structure and maternal employment achieve real
impact on children’s lives in the economic model. Economic models of child
development (e.g. Becker, 1981) suggest that families with higher economic resources
are better able to purchase or produce important goods or inputs for their children’s
development. Because resources mediate the effects of distal factors, evidence on
resources belongs in this section. However, there are many more studies on the effect
of income or family structure than there are on breaking down this effect into
component resource channels. Therefore, resources are discussed in detail in section 5
and we do not provide evidence on resources here.

Parental physical health

Parental physical health is also likely to be an important influence on parents’
interactions with children and infants but we do not discuss this mediating
characteristic in this report as it is unlikely to be sufficiently strongly associated with
parental education to be an important mediator of education effects. We emphasise,
however, that parental education is likely to influence strongly the capacity of parents
to deal with their own ill-health conditions or those of their children.

Interactions between characteristics

It is important to note that each category of characteristics also moderates the effects
of other categories. Thus, parents’ beliefs are moderated by poor parental well-being
and/or high levels of stress. For example, parents who are depressed feel less
efficacious in their ability to implement their parenting beliefs and goals (Elder &
Ardelt, 1992). Some interesting interactions between characteristics of context will be
noted.

4.2. Parental cognitions

The focus in this section is on the relationship between parents’ cognitions and
children’s outcomes in terms of various measures of children’s attainment and
achievement motivations. Cognitions can take the form of beliefs (both general and
more specific to individual children), attitudes (including stereotypes of gender,
culture and activity), aspirations and expectations, interest, values and knowledge.
These cognitions interact with each other as well as with both distal factors and

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