High-ability Peers Research Articles

Do disadvantaged students benefit from attending classes with more skilled colleagues? Evidence from a top university in Brazil

Using two rich administrative data sets and a rule of admission at one top university in Brazil that splits students into two classes, we apply a regression discontinuity design to study the effect of class allocation on academic performance and labor market outcomes. The last student of the first class will have higher-ability peers but a lower ordinal rank than the first student of the second class. These effects usually play in different directions. The main results suggest that the academic outcomes of affirmative action students in technology and health sciences majors are negatively impacted by being the last students in the first class. However, this negative effect does not translate into the labor market outcomes.

Human capital consequences of missing out on a grammar school education

This paper disentangles the effect of selective schooling on long-term human capital from that of individual background. The study design proxies entry test scores for selective secondary schools in England with historical data, estimating discontinuities in school assignment directly from the data. We find that, for the marginal admitted student, selective school attendance positively affects educational attainment. Adult labour market and health outcomes are not affected for the marginal admitted student. The effect on educational outcomes is conditional on having a favourable background, and partly explained by higher-ability peers and single-sex schools.

Ordinal rank and the structure of ability peer effects

Exposure to high-ability peers entails positive learning externalities, but it also decreases students’ academic self-concept because of lower ordinal ability rank. We show that, as a result, the linear-in-means parameter identifies a composite (i.e., reduced form) effect. We illustrate the empirical relevance of this issue using data from two experiments that randomly assign students to groups. We find that the structural effect of mean peer ability estimated by a model that includes rank is much larger than the reduced form effect obtained when rank is omitted. This finding also holds in non-linear and heterogeneous peer effects models and helps clarify the mechanisms behind the effects of ability tracking policies.

Classroom compositional effects on low-ability students' achievement in China.

Peer effects are at the center of educational policy debates regarding school choice, ability grouping, and instructional design. Though emerging empirical evidence suggests that positive peer effects exist, less is known about how it affects students with varying cognitive abilities. Using a nationally representative sample from China, we generated a student-level measure of classroom composition of peers based on cognitive ability to understand the benefits or pitfalls of placing low-ability students with heterogeneous or homogenous classmates. We conducted this analysis separately for grades seven and nine students after controlling for student background, family characteristics, and school endogeneity. We reaffirmed the overall positive-but small-peer effects on the performance rankings. Low-ability children scored much lower than their counterparts when they studied in cognitively diverse classrooms. However, this effect negates the overall positive impact of studying with high-ability peers and the pattern is consistent across rural and urban schools.

The Persistent Effects of Short-Term Peer Groups on Performance: Evidence from a Natural Experiment in Higher Education

This paper studies the persistent effects of short-term peer exposure on long-run performance in a college setting. I exploit the random assignment of undergraduates to peer groups during a mandatory orientation week and track the students’ performance over four years (until graduation). Assignment to orientation week groups with high levels of peer ability is associated with lower performance during the first year at college and a higher probability of early dropout. These adverse effects are driven entirely by the exposure of low-ability students to high-ability peers. Beyond the first year, exposure to higher peer ability during the orientation week negatively affects selection into the college’s most popular major (business administration) and final grade point average. Taken together, the findings suggest that the composition of short-term peer groups matters for individual choices and long-run performance outcomes. This paper was accepted by Yan Chen, decision analysis.

Peers and Motivation at Work

This paper sheds light on workplace peer effects by analyzing an experiment at a tea estate in Malawi. We randomly allocated tea-harvesting workers to fields and find strong evidence of positive effects from working near higher-ability peers. Our analy­sis shows that increasing the average of co-worker ability by 10 percent increases own productivity by 0.3 percent. In contrast to previous studies, we rule out that produc­tion or compensation externalities drive our results because workers receive piece-rates and do not work in teams. Additional analysis provides no support for the hypothesis that learning or worker socialization drive the effects. Instead, we provide suggestive evidence that workers view co-workers as a source of motivation. When given a choice to be re-assigned, the majority of workers want to work near fast (high-ability) co-workers. In open-ended survey responses, respondents state that being near faster peers provides motivation to work harder.

How Do Peers Impact Learning? An Experimental Investigation of Peer-to-Peer Teaching and Ability Tracking

Classroom peers are believed to influence learning by teaching each other, and the efficacy of this teaching likely depends on classroom composition in terms of peers’ ability. Unfortunately, little is known about peer-to-peer teaching because it is never observed in field studies. Furthermore, identifying how peer-to-peer teaching is affected by ability tracking—grouping students of similar ability—is complicated by the fact that tracking is typically accompanied by changes in curriculum and the instructional behavior of teachers. To fill this gap, we conduct a laboratory experiment in which subjects learn to solve logic problems and examine both the importance of peer-to-peer teaching and the interaction between peer-to-peer teaching and ability tracking. While peer-to-peer teaching improves learning among low-ability subjects, the positive effects are substantially offset by tracking. Tracking reduces the frequency of peer-to-peer teaching, suggesting that low-ability subjects suffer from the absence of high-ability peers to teach them.

How Do Peers Impact Learning? An Experimental Investigation of Peer-to-Peer Teaching and Ability Tracking

Classroom peers are believed to influence learning by teaching each other, and the efficacy of this teaching likely depends on classroom composition in terms of peers’ ability. Unfortunately, little is known about peer-to-peer teaching because it is never observed in field studies. Furthermore, identifying how peer-to-peer teaching is affected by ability tracking—grouping students of similar ability—is complicated by the fact that tracking is typically accompanied by changes in curriculum and the instructional behavior of teachers. To fill this gap, we conduct a laboratory experiment in which subjects learn to solve logic problems and examine both the importance of peer-to-peer teaching and the interaction between peer-to-peer teaching and ability tracking. While peer-to-peer teaching improves learning among low-ability subjects, the positive effects are substantially offset by tracking. Tracking reduces the frequency of peer-to-peer teaching, suggesting that low-ability subjects suffer from the absence of high-ability peers to teach them.

Peers and Motivation at Work: Evidence from a Firm Experiment in Malawi

This paper sheds light on workplace peer effects by analyzing an experiment at a tea estate in Malawi. We randomly allocated tea-harvesting workers to fields and find strong evidence of positive effects from working near higher-ability peers. Our analy­sis shows that increasing the average of co-worker ability by 10 percent increases own productivity by 0.3 percent. In contrast to previous studies, we rule out that produc­tion or compensation externalities drive our results because workers receive piece-rates and do not work in teams. Additional analysis provides no support for the hypothesis that learning or worker socialization drive the effects. Instead, we provide suggestive evidence that workers view co-workers as a source of motivation. When given a choice to be re-assigned, the majority of workers want to work near fast (high-ability) co-workers. In open-ended survey responses, respondents state that being near faster peers provides motivation to work harder.

Heterogeneity in peer effects in random dormitory assignment in a developing country

We study the effect of random dormitory assignment in a tertiary level educational institution in India on students’ subsequent academic achievements. We examine the importance of interactions between the characteristics of the student and his peers for educational outcomes, including non-linear peer-effects and the importance of different socio-economic and geographical backgrounds. We find that peer ability effects are around one-third the size of the effects of one's own ability, and students from non-urban and non-English backgrounds do particularly better when assigned to higher-ability peers. We find that all groups of ability students gain from being matched to high-ability peers, but that this gain is highest for students who are themselves of higher-ability. Our results suggest peer effects are stronger in the first year in dorm. In terms of mechanisms, we find no evidence for effects of peers via mental health, life satisfaction, or risk attitudes. We observe that a roommate's study times is highly correlated with a student's own study times, but we see only a weak positive association between study habits and grades.

Strategies for inclusion: Learning from students' perspectives on acceleration in inclusive education

• Ingrained misconceptions may restrict access to educational acceleration. • Our study found students support acceleration for high-ability peers. • Notions of equity and fairness emerged as important considerations. • Students may need instruction in the difference between equal treatment and equity. • Inclusion of accelerants may be promoted through classmate and teacher strategies.

The downside of good peers: How classroom composition differentially affects men's and women's STEM persistence

This paper investigates whether class composition can help explain why women are disproportionately more likely to fall out of the “STEM” pipeline. Identification comes from a standardized enrollment process at a large public university that essentially randomly assigns freshmen to different mandatory introductory chemistry lectures. Using administrative data, I find that women who are enrolled in a class with higher ability peers are less likely to graduate with a STEM degree, while men's STEM persistence is unaffected. The effect is largest for women in the bottom third of the ability distribution. I rule out that this is driven solely by grades.

A study of the cognitive diffusion model: facilitating students’ high level cognitive processes with authentic support

For this study the researchers designed learning activities to enhance students’ high level cognitive processes. Students learned new information in a classroom setting and then applied and analyzed their new knowledge in familiar authentic contexts by taking pictures of objects found there, describing them, and sharing their homework with peers. An experiment was carried out in which 58 junior high school students were divided into a control (n = 30) and an experimental (n = 28) group. The control group studied and completed learning activities with traditional textbooks while the experimental group used electronic textbooks and a learning system, Virtual Pen for Tablet PC (VPenTPC), in order to gauge the feasibility of the proposed approach. The post-test results show a significant difference between the control and experimental groups. In our analysis of the various approaches students took to complete the task, we were able to identify thirty cognitive and metacognitive strategies for using mobile technology, from which we selected the ten most frequently used ones. The results show that low ability students make better use of strategies than their high ability peers, resulting in significant learning gains. The results also show that most students perceive VPenTPC positively. Based on these results, we suggest some implications along with conclusions and directions for future research.

Estimation of Peer Effects with Predicted Social Ties: Evidence from Two Universities in Brazil and Russia

Social interactions with peers during learning have a significant impact on university students’ academic achievement. As social ties are voluntary, an empirical estimation of peer effects is exposed to a potential endogeneity problem. To overcome this issue, we propose to define the peer group of an individual as their predicted friends. The specific features of the learning environment in higher education institutions may affect dimensions along which friendship ties form. To test the presence of peer effects in different educational and cultural contexts, we use data on students studying in two universities located in two different countries, Brazil and Russia. We assume that friendship is affected by homophily in student attributes, such as having the same region of origin, the same gender, and sharing the same study group. In both institutions, we find positive externalities from having high-ability peers.

Learning from Peers

We study how peers impact worker productivity growth among salespeople in the cosmetics department of a department store. We first exploit a shift assignment policy that creates exogenous variation in salespersons’ peers each week to identify and quantify sources of worker learning. We find that peer-based learning is more important than learning-by-doing for individuals, and find no evidence of forgetting. Working with high-ability peers substantially increases the long-term productivity growth of new salespeople. We then examine possible mechanisms behind peer-based learning by exploiting the multiple collocated firms in our setting that sell products with different task difficulties, and compensate their sales force using either team-based or individual-based compensation systems. The variation in incentives to compete and cooperate within and across firm boundaries, combined with variation in sales difficulty for different product classes, allows us to suggest two mechanisms behind peer-based learning: observing successful sales techniques of peers and direct teaching. Our paper advocates the importance of learning from one another in the workplace, and suggests that individual peer-based learning is a foundation of both organizational learning curves and knowledge spillovers across firms.

Learning from Peers: Knowledge Transfer and Sales Force Productivity Growth

We study how peers impact worker productivity growth among salespeople in the cosmetics department of a department store. We first exploit a shift assignment policy that creates exogenous variation in salespersons' peers each week to identify and quantify sources of worker learning. We find that peer-based learning is more important than learning-by-doing for individuals, and there is no evidence of forgetting. Working with high-ability peers substantially increases the long-term productivity growth of new salespeople. We then examine possible mechanisms behind peer-based learning by exploiting the multiple colocated firms in our setting that sell products with different task difficulties and compensate their sales forces using either team-based or individual-based compensation systems. The variation in incentives to compete and cooperate within and across firm boundaries, combined with variation in sales difficulty for different product classes, allows us to suggest two mechanisms behind peer-based learning: observing successful sales techniques of peers and direct teaching. Our paper advocates the importance of learning from one another in the workplace and suggests that individual peer-based learning is a foundation of both organizational learning curves and knowledge spillovers across firms.

Who gets more financial aid in China? A multilevel analysis

The Chinese financial aid system intends to increase the affordability of postsecondary education and provide access to college for disadvantaged students. However, the research base for access to aid in China is extremely thin. Using data from a large cross-sectional survey in Beijing, this study found that attending selective institutions with high-ability peers was positively correlated with the amount of aid awarded and the probability of receiving aid. Female students, students with college-educated fathers, and students from poorer households were expected to receive more aid. Junior and senior students along with more able individuals in science-related majors obtained significantly more financial assistance.

The Effects of Peer Group Heterogeneity on the Production of Human Capital at West Point

Understanding how heterogeneity in peer group composition affects academic attainment has important implications for how schools organize students in group settings. The random assignment of cadets to companies at West Point affords an opportunity to investigate this issue empirically. Estimates of the impact of peer group heterogeneity in math SAT scores on freshmen-year academic performance reveals that more heterogeneous peer groups have positive effects on individual grades. High-ability peers account for most of the positive effect, while low-ability peers have no measureable effect. (JEL I23, J24, M54)

A Study of Well-Being and School Satisfaction Among Academically Talented Students Attending a Science High School in Korea

The purpose of this study was to examine whether academically talented adolescents attending a residential science high school in Korea had different levels of psychological well-being or school life satisfaction than their high-ability peers in regular high schools. The participating high-ability students ( n = 299) were in their second year of high school and were attending either a science high school ( n = 111) or a regular high school ( n = 188) in the same province in Korea. Both groups completed the Psychological Well Being scales (Ryff, 1989a) and a researcher-constructed Satisfaction With School Life scale. In addition, the science high school students responded to open-ended questions about their experiences in the science high school. No statistically significant differences were found in psychological well-being, but there were statistically significant differences in school life satisfaction favoring the science high school group. The responses of the science high school sample to the open-ended questions indicated that they appreciated the advanced curriculum and the expertise of their teachers. They also reported satisfactory relationships with teachers and peers. Overall, the study suggested that the residential science high school was meeting the educational needs of these talented Korean students, at least better than traditional high schools. However, this study could not confirm its primary expectation that the specialized schooling for gifted students would enhance psychological well-being. Implications of the study for research and practice are discussed.

Educational peer effects and the Chicago public schools

Using data on third and sixth grade students in the Chicago public schools, I examine peer effects using variation in school tracking policies. In tracked schools, high ability students receive the benefit of being placed in classes with high ability peers. The opposite is the case for low ability students. If peer effects were important, one would expect students with high initial ability in tracked schools to outperform similar students in untracked schools. Similarly, students with low initial ability in tracked schools should lag behind their counterparts in untracked schools. Using an identification strategy that takes advantage of this intuition, I find peer effects to be quite small, though generally positive and statistically significant.