Unexcused Absences Research Articles

Inequities in Educational and Psychological Outcomes Between LGBTQ and Straight Students in Middle and High School

This study finds that, compared with straight-identified youth, youth who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or questioning (LGBTQ) are at greater risk of suicidal thoughts, suicide attempts, victimization by peers, and elevated levels of unexcused absences from school. Results disaggregated by LGBTQ subgroups reveal heterogeneity within the broad LGBTQ group, with bisexual youth appearing to be particularly at risk. Also, although the risk gaps in school belongingness and unexcused absences are significant in high school, we find that these gaps are significantly greater in middle school, suggesting heightened early risk for LGBTQ-identified students. By raising awareness of educational inequities related to LGBTQ identification, this study lays the descriptive groundwork for interventions aimed at improving psychological and educational outcomes for these students.

Absent Peers in Elementary Years: The Negative Classroom Effects of Unexcused Absences on Standardized Testing Outcomes

Background/ContextThis article addresses the classroom contextual effects of absences on student achievement. Previous research on peer effects has predominantly focused on peer socioeconomic status or classroom academic ability and its effects on classmates. However, the field has been limited by not discerning the individual-level academic effects of being in classrooms with absent peers.Purpose/Objective/Research Question/Focus of the StudyThe purpose of this study is to determine the peer effects of absent students in urban elementary school classrooms.Population/Participants/SubjectsThe data set is longitudinal and comprises entire populations of five elementary school cohorts within the School District of Philadelphia, for a total of 33,420 student observations. Individual student records were linked to teacher and classroom data and to census block neighborhood information.Research DesignTo examine the educational effects of absent peers, this study employed an empirical specification of the education production function. The dependent variables were Stanford Achievement Test Ninth Edition (SAT9) reading and math scores.FindingsModels differentiated between unexcused and total absence measures and indicated that the peer effect of absences was driven by negative effects associated with classroom rates of unexcused absences rather with rates of total absences. These findings were obtained after controlling for student, neighborhood, teacher, and classroom characteristics.Conclusions/RecommendationsNot only are absences detrimental to the absentee, but they also have a pervasive effect on the achievement of other students in the classroom.

The Effects of School-wide Positive Behavior Support on Middle School Climate and Student Outcomes

This study investigated the effects of school-wide positive behavior support (SWPBS) on middle school climate and student outcomes. Data consisted of more than 300 teacher responses and 10,000 student responses in two middle schools in the western United States. This study used a quasi-experimental (non-equivalent two-group, pretest-posttest) design. One school implemented a SWPBS intervention over a period of four years, while the other served as a control. The SWPBS intervention included school-wide teaching of social skills, praise notes from teachers to students, posting of school rules, proactive screening for students at risk for emotional and behavioral disorders, and referrals of at-risk students for targeted interventions. The treatment school showed statistically significant improvements in teacher ratings of school climate, while the control school tended to stay the same or worsen. Statistically significant decreases were also evident in students’ tardiness, unexcused absences, and office discipline referrals when compared to the control school. Implications and limitations of this study are addressed.

Book Review: Roth-Douquet, K., & Schaeffer, F.(2006). AWOL: The Unexcused Absence of America’s Upper Classes from Military Service—and How It Hurts Our Country. New York: HarperCollins

Book Review: Roth-Douquet, K., & Schaeffer, F.(2006). AWOL: The Unexcused Absence of America’s Upper Classes from Military Service—and How It Hurts Our Country. New York: HarperCollins

Score Reliability and Validity of the Student Risk Screening Scale: A Psychometrically Sound, Feasible Tool for Use in Urban Middle Schools

In this article, the authors examine the psychometric properties of the Student Risk Screening Scale (SRSS) for use in urban middle schools. Results of Studies 1 and 2 suggest strong internal consistency and test—retest stability. Study 1 supports the predictive validity of the SRSS, with students at low risk being able to be differentiated from moderate- to high-risk status on behavioral and academic measures. Study 2 also supports predictive validity up to 2 years following initial SRSS status, with students in the low-risk group having significantly fewer out-of-school suspensions, fewer unexcused absences, and higher grade point averages than students in the moderate- and high-risk groups. In addition, results of Study 1 support the feasibility of the SRSS, with increased use over time serving as a behavioral marker for social validity. Limitations and implications for future research are discussed.

Effects of part-time work on adolescent development in Korea

Reflecting fast-growing adolescent populations involving in part-time work in the Korean context, we tackle the issue of youth part-time employment. Even though previous research has documented the negative effect of part-time employment on adolescent development, it is still controversial whether the undesirable effect stems from differential socialization shaped by part-time work, because the different selection issue remains unsolved. Thus, we explored the effects of part-time work experience on problem behaviors and school disengagement, using Propensity Score Matching (PSM) analysis. Our findings from the Korean Education Employment Panel data illuminate that part-time work had significantly negative effects on four outcome variables (i.e., drinking, smoking, disciplinary punishment, and unexcused absence) even after pre-existing differences between groups were controlled by the PSM. Implications for the finding are reviewed.

Excused Versus Unexcused: How Student Absences in Elementary School Affect Academic Achievement

The literature on school absences has focused predominantly on the reasons for student truancy, or it has assessed only aggregate student absences in their effect on achievement. However, this study brings forth a new issue: the relationship between types of absences—excused versus unexcused—and school performance. With a quantitative model of educational achievement on a longitudinal multilevel data set of all second-through fourth-grade students in the Philadelphia School District from 1994 to 2000, this study disaggregated absence information to provide new insight on the attendance–achievement relationship. Specifically, a model using fixed effects with classroom-level clustering was employed to determine how the distinction among varying proportions of excused versus unexcused absences related to students’ standardized test performance in reading and math. This article demonstrates that distinguishing between students with high rates of excused or unexcused absences is significant. Having a higher proportion of excused absences to total absences exhibits a positive relationship between reading and math test scores. Conversely, students with a higher proportion of unexcused absences places them at academic risk, particularly in math achievement and as early as in elementary school. Implications for policy are discussed.

Confirmatory Factor Analysis of the School Refusal Assessment Scale-Revised in an African American Community Sample

The current study used confirmatory factor analysis techniques to investigate the construct validity of the child version of the School Refusal Assessment Scale - Revised (SRAS-R) in a community sample of low socioeconomic status, urban, African American fifth and sixth graders (n = 174). The SRAS-R is the best-researched measure of school refusal behavior in youth and typically yields four functional dimensions. Results of the investigation suggested that a modified version of the four-factor model, in which three items from the tangible reinforcement dimension are removed, may have construct validity in the current sample of youth. In addition, youth endorsement of the dimension measuring avoidance of social and/or evaluative situations was positively associated with unexcused absences. Implications for further psychometric research and early identification and prevention of problematic absenteeism in low-SES, ethnic minority community samples are highlighted.

WASTIN’ AWAY IN MARGARITAVILLE? NEW EVIDENCE ON THE ACADEMIC EFFECTS OF TEENAGE BINGE DRINKING

I. INTRODUCTION The problems of teenage alcohol use are well documented in the public health and health economics literatures. Adolescent alcohol consumption is associated with adverse health consequences, crime, traffic fatalities, out-of-wedlock teenage childbearing, lower socioeconomic status, and poorer quality marriages (Cook and Moore, 1993; Dee, 1999, 2001; Grossman et al., 1993; Kenkel and Ribar, 1994; National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, 2000; Rees, Argys, and Averett, 2001; Sen, 2003). Underage drinking is also not uncommon. According to the 2003 Youth Risk Behavior Study, over half of high school students report consuming at least one drink in the past 30 d (Youth Risk Behavior Study, 2003). Because alcohol consumption patterns often emerge during individuals' early teenage years, understanding the determinants and consequences of adolescent drinking behavior is important (DeSimone and Wolaver, 2006; Koch and McGeary, 2005). Recent empirical studies examining the relationship between teenage alcohol consumption and schooling have produced mixed results. Several studies have found that alcohol consumption reduces investments in schooling (Cook and Moore, 1993; Koch and McGeary, 2005; Mullahy and Sindelar, 1989; Williams, Powell, and Wechsler, 2003; Wolaver, 2002; Yamada et al., 1996), but other recent work (Dee and Evans, 2003; Koch and Ribar, 2001; Duarte and Escario, 2005) casts doubt on these findings, suggesting that alcohol consumption has only a modest effect or no effect on schooling. Each of these studies has stressed the importance of carefully addressing unmeasured heterogeneity, which may mitigate estimated human capital effects. Despite a growing body of literature on the effects of teenage drinking on future educational attainment, less attention has been paid to the effects of adolescent alcohol consumption on contemporaneous academic achievement. While examining the effect of teenage drinking on school attainment is important and informative, focusing on this outcome alone may understate the full effects of drinking. If alcohol consumption negatively affects precollege academic performance by diminishing cognitive abilities or by reducing the efficiency of producing effective study time, these adverse academic spillovers may have important direct effects on future human capital accumulation and earnings. Betts and Morrell (1999, p. 269) note that grade point average (GPA) reflects human capital acquisition at a time when young adults are close to permanent entry into the labor force. Moreover, there is evidence to suggest that high school GPA is an important determinant of earnings (Grogger and Eide, 1995; Rose and Betts, 2004) and academic performance in college (Barron and Norman, 1992; Cohn et al., 2004). This study uses a national data set not yet exploited in the alcohol-human capital literature, the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health), to examine the relationship between teenage binge drinking and three measures of academic performance: pre-college GPA, receipt of an out-of-school suspension, and having an unexcused absence from school. Ordinary least square (OLS) estimates consistently show that there is a negative relationship between adolescent binge drinking and academic performance. However, after exploiting multiple waves of the Add Health data and including individual fixed effects, the estimated effect of binge drinking on academic performance falls substantially. These findings suggest that previous estimates of the effect of binge drinking on schooling may be overstated. II. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK An adolescent is assumed to maximize utility, U(A, S, L)--which is a function of alcohol consumption (A), academic performance (S), and leisure (L)--subject to time, budget, and human capital production constraints. (1) The schooling production function is given by: (1) S = [Florin] (m, pe, a, q, h, t, z), where m is student motivation, pe is parental effort and involvement, a is student ability, q is school quality, h is health, t is time spent studying, and z are individual- and community-level tastes. …

Six Strategies to Help Young Adolescents at the Tipping Point in Urban Middle Schools

Here in Washington, we talk a lot about the need for change - changing our priorities or the way we do business. For children, however, change can be frightening, and the middle school years are a time of dramatic change for them. Young adolescents are grappling with confusing and often difficult changes in their emotions, their bodies, their schools, their schedules, and the social and academic expectations placed upon them. Middle school administrators, teachers, and support staff face unique challenges, and to succeed, these professionals need help and support from parents and community leaders as well as the government. Unfortunately, government has not always lived up to its end of the bargain. When President Bush signed No Child Left Behind, burdening the middle grades with new high expectations for accountability and assessment, the Bush Administration and Congress promised to provide the funding schools and teachers would need to make the program successful. That promise was not kept. We do need change in Washington - change in the way we think about our middle schools and in what we can do to help meet the high expectations we have set - and change in the high expectations we want young adolescents to set for themselves. My interest in middle school education began as attorney general of the state of Rhode Island. I was elected to that position after having served as Rhode Island's United States attorney. As U.S. attorney, I prosecuted bank robbers, polluters, corrupt public officials, those accused of fraud, drug dealers, and other traditional adult criminals. But when I was elected state attorney general, something changed - I was prosecuting children. In fact, nearly 2,000 juvenile cases came across my desk each year involving everything from drug offenses and gang-related activity to so-called status offenses, like truancy and running away from home, that are not crimes for adults. As I tried to understand what was behind these cases, what had gone wrong in these young peoples' lives, a common tipping point seemed to be failure in middle school. It was middle school where these kids started to get seriously off track. At the same time, these young adolescents also appeared still open to positive influences. At that age, students are still children, and dedicated teachers can instill in them the importance of education. High school seemed too late; the bad habits like truancy had already taken hold. We also found that one of the best predictors of middle school failure was truancy, often catastrophic truancy - 60, 90, or 100 days of unexcused absence from school. Studies show that youth who are chronically truant are more likely to use drugs, become delinquent, and drop out of school - data that bears out what we were seeing in Rhode Island (Henry & Huizinga, 2007). So, in an effort to build the proverbial fence at the top of the hill instead of waiting for the wrecks at the bottom, my office tried to intervene. We started with truancy enforcement. We discovered that local police officers mistakenly thought they could not pick up kids for truancy. Working with the police department and the local faith community, we established a program for officers to take truant young people back to their schools. This approach worked in theory, as the schools and the police department came together to implement the project. But at the grassroots level, teachers objected. Faced with overcrowded classrooms, reluctant to deal with students brought back to school by a police escort, unwilling to take time away from the children who did show up to class trying to learn, teachers sent a clear signal back to police officers (Find a police officer who does not have a teacher somewhere in the family!) that these kids were a disrupture presence in the schools. The fence we were trying to build, it seemed, was still too far down the hill. We realized that dealing with the entire city of Providence was probably too ambitious. …

Evaluation of a School-based Mentoring Program for At-Risk Middle School Youth

This study investigated the impact of a school-based mentoring program on at-risk students' office referrals, unexcused absences, and school attitude. Students who participated in the mentoring program had statistically significant reductions in office referrals and statistically significant improvements in school attitude. Based on an analysis of mentor interview responses and log entries, mentors were divided into “viewed positively” mentors and “questioned-impact” mentors. Viewed positively mentors reported fewer office referrals, met more consistently with mentees, reported more relaxed mentoring sessions, and shared food and played games more often with their mentees than “questioned-impact” mentors. The results of the study are discussed in terms of the available research on school-based mentoring. In addition, suggestions for future research are provided.

Does Pollution Increase School Absences?

LTHOUGH substantial policy initiatives are aimed at reducing air pollution, uncertainty remains about the nature and extent of benefits from these actions. Existing epidemiological studies point to a variety of health impacts, but it remains difficult to assess the economic or social values of these impacts. It is also difficult to be confident that existing studies separate the causal impacts of pollution from correlated effects of neighborhoods, poverty, and a variety of household choices. We focus on how pollution affects school absences. By matching detailed schooling records with variations in the level of specific pollutants, we are able to establish a strong link to school absences. A large literature links child health and human capital attainment. Grossman and Kaestner (1997) summarize this literature and point to school absences as a major causal link in this relationship: children who miss a lot of school achieve poorer grades, are less engaged with school, and are more likely to drop out. Absences are also of concern to parents, who have to miss work, and to school districts, because state funding frequently depends on attendance. In states where funding depends on student attendance, schools can lose as much as $50 per day per unexcused absence. Nonetheless, policy interventions that might reduce absences are less clear. Air pollution is a possible cause of school absence for some children. Children with respiratory problems such as

Early Adolescent Sex and Diminished School Attachment: Selection or Spillovers?

Using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, this study examines the relationship between adolescent virginity and four measures of school attachment: out‐of‐school suspensions, unexcused absences from school, affinity for school, and preference to attend college. Ordinary least squares and school fixed effects estimates reflect that adolescents who engage in sexual activity are less likely to be attached to school than virgins. However, after controlling for unmeasured heterogeneity via individual fixed effects and instrumental variables, the evidence of a causal link is weaker, with modest adverse effects of early teen sex observed for the youngest teenagers. The results suggest that adverse educational spillovers of early teen sex are sensitive to controls for unobservables.

A study on family-school cooperation based on an analysis of school documentation

Family-school cooperation is a very complex process that can be studied at different levels in a number of different ways. This study has covered only some aspects of cooperation between parents and teachers, based on school documentation of a Belgrade elementary school. The study covered analyses of 60 Attendance Registers pertaining to 60 classes with 1289 students from Grade 1 through Grade 8 during an academic year. The unit of analysis included: parents attendance at PTA meetings and individual meetings between parents and teachers. In addition to the frequency of parents? visits to school, the relationship between such registered parents' visits and overall academic performance, grades in conduct, excused and unexcused absence from classes were also considered. The research findings indicated interference between development factors (attitude change in parent-child relationship and growing-up) and parents? informal "theory of critical grades" i.e. transitional processes in schooling. The findings confirmed that parents? individual visits to school were mainly meant to offer an excuse for the student?s absence from school, while attendance at PTA meetings was linked to poor grades in conduct and missed classes (both excused and unexcused). The findings also showed that parents pursued visiting strategies which were pragmatic, less time-consuming and less emotionally draining ones. The closing part refers to discussions on practical use of the study and possible further research. .

Contingency Management for the Treatment of Methamphetamine Use Disorders

Theory and some preliminary evidence suggest that contingency management may be an effective treatment strategy or adjunct to psychosocial treatment for methamphetamine use disorders. An experimentally rigorous investigation on the topic was provided by a large multisite trial conducted under the auspices of the Clinical Trials Network of the National Institute on Drug Abuse. The authors report data on 113 participants who were diagnosed with methamphetamine abuse or dependence. They were randomly assigned to receive 12 weeks of either treatment as usual or treatment as usual plus contingency management. Urine samples were tested for illicit drugs, and breath samples were tested for alcohol. The reinforcers for drug-negative samples were plastic chips, some of which could be exchanged for prizes. The number of plastic chips drawn increased with each week of negative samples but was reset to one after a missed or positive sample. The participants in both groups remained in treatment for equivalent times, but those receiving contingency management in addition to usual treatment submitted significantly more negative samples, and they were abstinent for a longer period of time (5 versus 3 weeks). These results suggest that contingency management has promise as a component in treatment strategies for methamphetamine use disorder.

THE TRUANCY COURT DIVERSION PROGRAM OF THE FAMILY COURT, WARREN CIRCUIT COURT DIVISION III, BOWLING GREEN, KENTUCKY: AN EVALUATION OF IMPACT ON ATTENDANCE AND ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE

Educators, parents, and community services partnered with the family court judge to implement the Truancy Court Diversion Program (TCDP). TCDP significantly impacted unexcused absences, unexcused tardies, and academic performance of the elementary and junior high students participating in the program. Elementary participants were more likely to maintain their improved attendance following participation than were junior high participants. Nonetheless, junior high participant grade point averages increased during TCDP and were maintained subsequent to TCDP. TCDP was an effective intervention for improving attendance and academic performance and helping preclude future delinquency.

Counting the Truants

Perfect attendance. But for one day of third grade, I would have had perfect attendance from kindergarten through high school graduation. I missed that single day because my parents made me stay home. Getting up and going to school was, for me, an act of self-preservation. I was sure that, if I missed any new material, I would get so far behind that I'd never catch up. It was entirely my choice. Sick or healthy, I was at my desk. While Huckleberry Finn's aversion to attending school falls at one end of the spectrum, and my compulsion falls at the other, most students are somewhere in between. When students don't make a choice that places them somewhere in my vicinity, parents usually help them make it. If parents don't follow through or if they're unsuccessful, the school usually steps in. And if that doesn't work, state law asserts itself. MORE THAN 'BE THERE OR BE SQUARE' Compulsory attendance laws help to ensure both that educational services are provided and that students take advantage of those services. These laws set minimum and maximum ages for school attendance. For example, if in Alabama students must begin to attend school at age 7 and continue attending until the age of 16, the mandatory number of years of education is nine. Twelve states require nine years of education; 18 states require 10; eight states require 11; eight require 12; and four states and the District of Columbia require students to attend school for a total of 13 years. The minimum ages range from 5 to 8 years old, with the highest number of states (24) requiring attendance to begin at age 6. Twenty-eight states require students to attend school until they reach the age of 16; 17 states set 18 as the school-leaving age. Between 1984 and 2005, 14 states raised the upper age limit for compulsory attendance in order to keep students in schools longer. TRUANCY AND HABITUAL TRUANCY If students choose not to attend school, however, at what point are they found to be truant? For many years, most state laws did not specify the number of times a student must be absent without an excuse before legal sanctions are enforced. Over the past decade, though, a growing number of states have begun to explicitly define truancy--or require their districts to define it. And some have even established guidelines for when a student should be designated a truant. In Arizona, for example, truancies are defined as unexcused absences for at least one class period during a school day. Habitually students are those for at least five school days during a school year. To be in California a student has to be absent without a valid excuse for three full days in one school year, or absent without a valid excuse for more than any 30-minute period during a single school day on three occasions in one school year, or any combination thereof. And such absences must be reported to the attendance supervisor or to the superintendent. A student is deemed to be a habitual truant if he or she has been reported three or more times during a school year and if the attendance officer has made a conscientious effort to hold a conference with a parent or guardian. Whew! That's some serious record-keeping. In Colorado, four unexcused absences in one month or 10 unexcused absences during any school year make a student a truant. INCREASING ENFORCEMENT States such as Virginia have attempted to put more teeth into their attendance laws. In 2004, the Virginia legislature removed a restriction on the court's use of contempt power in enforcing compulsory school attendance and parental responsibility. The revised law clarifies and reinforces the court's authority to order the child or the parent or both into programs, such as extended-day programs, summer school, or other educational programs, and into treatment, such as counseling. In October 2005, the state board of education in Louisiana reestablished Truancy Assessment and Service Centers, which had previously targeted low-income families, as a means to identify, assess, and intervene to ensure K-6 students attend school regularly. …

Okay to Be Different?

WHEN MY 29-year-old son was 6, he came home one day from kindergarten and said, isn't good. Normal isn't bad. It isn't anything. Normal is what you are. For me, this observation was especially poignant, as he was born without his left hand, and his parents have adamantly declared him normal throughout his entire life. I've never been sure whether his wonderful kindergarten teacher explained his physical handicap to the class that way or whether Joe came up with it on his own. But whichever way it was, I have always loved the statement is what you are. So differences are okay. In fact, they don't make you better or worse. Too bad we all worry so much about them. Differences in how states calculate AYP (adequate yearly progress) abound. Does that make one state better than another? Worse? Or is each state doing its best to be normal? States make decisions based on the information at hand, and then they move ahead, trying to make the best of those decisions. Under the No Child Left Behind Act, each state defines what constitutes a full academic year; sets the rigor of state standards for math, language arts/reading, and science; selects the assessments to be used; sets the cut scores for proficiency for each; determines which academic will be used; and sets the performance standard for each. Sum up all of these activities, and you have normal for each state. But put them all together for all the states, and that's a whole lot of variation. I just finished compiling the academic used by states to determine AYP. Of course, NCLB requires the main indicators to be student performance on academic assessments, but the designated contributes to determining AYP, too. For elementary and middle schools, most states have selected attendance as the other indicator. For high schools, NCLB requires states to use the graduation rate. Attendance-Rate Targets Thirty-seven states use attendance as the other academic indicator for their elementary and middle schools (or, as some stipulate, for any school that does not have a graduating class). The target rates for attendance in those states for the current year range all the way from 80% attendance to 95.8%. Many states set the target but allow improvement from the prior year's attendance as an alternative goal. Iowa, for example, sets 95.8% as its goal, but it says that at least one of the following criteria must be met to make AYP: 1) the rate is greater than or equal to the state goal; 2) the rate falls within the established confidence interval; or 3) the rate has improved from the previous year. Some states vary the target each year, ratcheting up expectations, with the ultimate goal set for 2013-14. Illinois' current target is 88%, increasing annually to a final measure of 92% in 2013-14. Michigan's 2005 goal is 85%, increasing to 90% by 2008-09. Oregon allows a two-year weighted average to be considered. Washington stipulates a reduction of unexcused absences. Calculating Attendance In addition to setting the performance targets, states can select different definitions of what constitutes being in school for the day. In Maryland, for example, average daily attendance for a given year is based on the number of enrolled students who are each from September to June. For reporting purposes, attendance and absence are counted in one-half-day units, with a student being counted as for one-half day if he or she is in attendance for any part of the day. A student is counted as for an entire day if for more than one-half of the day. Students for more than one-half day are counted as for the full day. The Montana Office of Public Instruction collects present and absent information at two points in the school year: October and February. Rhode Island allows data rounding for its participation rates and attendance rates. …

Project start: An evaluation of a community-wide school-based intervention to reduce truancy

The study evaluated the effectiveness of a community-based court intervention aimed at reducing truancy in a large urban school district. A quasi-experimental design was used to assess attendance outcomes for 567 truants matched on demographics and drawn from three categories of intervention (no court referral, traditional court referral, and court referral with community-based services). A court group by time ANOVA was conducted. Truancy levels remained high and unchanged for nonreferred truants throughout the study. Both court groups showed a significant drop in absences 30 days post court. During the subsequent 30-day period, the community-based court maintained the reduced rates, while the traditional court group showed higher truancy levels than the community-based court group. No significant interaction effects were found between court groups and sex, age group, or ethnic categories. At one year follow-up, the community-based court group continued to show significantly lower levels of unexcused absences compared to the other two experimental groups. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Psychol Schs 42: 657–667, 2005.

Student Performance in Intermediate Economic Theory: Does 'Diligence' Matter

We employ a production function approach to analyze the performance of our intermediate theory students. The dependent variables are measures of examination performance. The explanatory variables include measures of intellectual ability and performance in prerequisite courses and personal characteristics such as gender. Since we want to determine whether diligence has a statistically significant impact on examination performance, the explanatory variables include three measures of effort: the average grade on homework exercises completed, the share of homework exercises completed, and the number of unexcused absences. We find that all three have a statistically significant on test averages. The homework grade and share of homeworks completed have positive effects on test performance, while the number of unexcused absences has a negative effect. We also examine the impact of these variables on the written, problem, and multiple-choice subsections of the macroeconomics exams. Here the impact of our effort variables on student performance mixed.