RC28 INTERGENERATIONAL TRANSFER, HUMAN CAPITAL, AND INEQUALITY CONFERENCE
Singapore, May 26-28, 2016
Cognitive and non-cognitive Skills and the Reproduction of Inequalities
Wiebke Schulz, Bielefeld University and DIW Berlin (Germany)
Reinhard Schunck, , Bielefeld University (Germany)
This study addresses the role of cognitive (general cognitive abilities) and non-cognitive (selfefficacy) skills for educational
achievement. Cognitive and non-cognitive skills are in part inherited and in part nurtured by one’s family of origin.
Nevertheless, research so far has paid little attention to disentangling the influence of non-cognitive and cognitive skills
from other origin effects. The first aim of this study is to assess the influence of these skills net of social origin confounders.
The second aim is to address assess the stratification of these skills and their potential contingency of their effects on
family of origin characteristics. We test the resource substitution hypothesis according to which skills will have more
beneficial effects among children from lower social classes, as a lack of skills in higher classes can be substituted by other
resources. We base our analyses on the newly available TwinLife data, a representative sample of identical and fraternal
twins and their families in Germany. Our results indicate that both general cognitive abilities and self-efficacy are stratified
according by social origin. Moreover, general cognitive abilities and self-efficacy affect educational achievement
independent of social origin. However, a large part of the association seems to be driven by unobserved confounders
associated with the family of origin. The results do not indicate support for the resource substitution hypothesis, i.e.
neither the effect of general cognitive abilities nor selfefficacy is moderated by social origin.