Abstract
Recent research has documented Minorities' Diminished Returns (MDRs), defined as weaker protective effects of parental educational attainment and other socioeconomic status (SES) indicators for racial and ethnic minority groups. To explore racial differences in the associations between parental educational attainment and youth educational outcomes among American high schoolers. This cross-sectional study used baseline data from the Education Longitudinal Study (ELS-2002), a nationally representative survey of 10th grade American youth. This study analyzed 10702 youth who were composed of 2020 (18.9%) non-Hispanic Black and 8682 (81.1%) non-Hispanic White youth. The dependent variables were youth math and reading grades. The independent variable was parental educational attainment. Gender, parental marital status, and school characteristics (% students receiving free lunch, academic risk factors, urban school, public school) were the covariates. Race was the moderating variable. Linear regression was used for data analysis. Overall, higher parental educational attainment was associated with higher math and reading test scores. We found a significant interaction between race (Non-Hispanic Black) and parental education attainment on math and reading test scores, suggesting that the boosting effects of high parental educational attainment on youth educational outcomes might be systemically smaller for Non-Hispanic Black than for Non-Hispanic White youth. While high parental educational attainment promotes educational outcomes for youth, this association is weaker for Non-Hispanic Black youth than non-Hispanic White youth. The diminished returns of parental education are beyond what can be explained by school characteristics that differ between Non-Hispanic Black and non-Hispanic White students. Diminishing returns of parental educational attainment (MDRs) may be an unrecognized source of racial youth disparities. Equalizing SES would not be enough for equalizing outcomes. There is a need for public and economic policies that reduce diminished returns of SES for Black families.
Highlights
The Black-White school achievement gap is a serious concern in the United States (Chavous, Rivas-Drake, Smalls, Griffin, & Cogburn, 2008)
These interactions suggested that the boosting effects of high parental educational attainment on youth scores are systemically smaller for Non-Hispanic Black than for Non-Hispanic White youth
The current study showed that 1) overall, high parental educational attainment is associated with higher math and reading score in youth; 2) these associations are weaker for non-Hispanic Black than for Non-Hispanic White families
Summary
The Black-White school achievement gap is a serious concern in the United States (Chavous, Rivas-Drake, Smalls, Griffin, & Cogburn, 2008). As academic achievement is an early contributor to the inequalities later in life (Chavous et al, 2008) and because school achievement closely correlates with several desired outcomes, elimination of racial disparities in school performance should be considered as a strategic goal by the US society. This is in part because the BlackWhite achievement gap is considered the gateway to the future racial health disparities later in life (Basch, 2011; Burchinal et al, 2011; Gorey, 2009; Hair, Hanson, Wolfe, & Pollak, 2015; Larson, Russ, Nelson, Olson, & Halfon, 2015). The common belief is that the main reason developmental youth outcomes tend to be worse for non-Hispanic Black youth is lower SES in Black families (Benjet et al, 2009)
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