Parental Incentives and Early Childhood Achievement: A Field Experiment in Chicago Heights / Roland G. Fryer, Jr., Steven D. Levitt, John A. List.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Fryer, Roland G, Jr.

Contributor:

National Bureau of Economic Research.

Levitt, Steven D.

List, John A.

Series:

Working Paper Series (National Bureau of Economic Research) no. w21477.

NBER working paper series no. w21477

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource: illustrations (black and white);

Other Title:

Parental Incentives and Early Childhood Achievement

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Mass. National Bureau of Economic Research 2015.

Summary:

This article describes a randomized field experiment in which parents were provided financial incentives to engage in behaviors designed to increase early childhood cognitive and executive function skills through a parent academy. Parents were rewarded for attendance at early childhood sessions, completing homework assignments with their children, and for their child's demonstration of mastery on interim assessments. This intervention had large and statistically significant positive impacts on both cognitive and non-cognitive test scores of Hispanics and Whites, but no impact on Blacks. These differential outcomes across races are not attributable to differences in observable characteristics (e.g. family size, mother's age, mother's education) or to the intensity of engagement with the program. Children with above median (pre-treatment) non cognitive scores accrue the most benefits from treatment.

Notes:

Print version record

August 2015.