majority children self-selected in diverse classes. This would have the effect of reversing
the causal order between diversity and ethnic tolerance: parents who are more tolerant
from the beginning “create” diverse classrooms by sending their children to schools with
a mixed ethnic intake (or vice versa, intolerant parents sending their children to all-white
schools - which would have the same effect). Although a selection effect can partly be
neutralized by controlling for individual background variables (as I have done) and is
likely to be small in societies with limited school choice such as Sweden (Kokkonen et al
2010), it cannot rule out that some self-selection has occurred. To eliminate this bias and
establish the “value added” effect of diversity, it is indispensible that future survey
studies adopt a longitudinal panel design with repeated measures of the outcomes of
interest.
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