Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/141554 
Year of Publication: 
2016
Series/Report no.: 
IZA Discussion Papers No. 9795
Publisher: 
Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA), Bonn
Abstract: 
We investigate the relationship between peers' abilities and educational outcomes at the end of high school using data from the rich Longitudinal Study of Young People in England (LSYPE) matched to the National Pupil Database of children in state schools in England. In particular, we focus on the effect of peers' abilities, measured through achievements in Key Stage 3 (Age 14), on high powered test scores at Ages 16 and 18, and on the probability of attending university. Our identification strategy is based on a measure of the peers of peers' ability. In particular, for each individual, we look at her high school peers and select their primary school peers who do not attend the same high school and who did not attend the same primary school as the individual. We then use peers-of-peers ability, measured using Age 11 test scores as an instrument for high school average peer ability, measured using Age 14 test scores. We also use quantile regression to explore the effect of peers' ability on different parts of the distributions of the outcomes. Our results show that average of peers' abilities has a moderate positive effect on test scores at Ages 16 and 18, and that being in a school with a large proportion of low-quality peers can have a significantly detrimental effect on individual achievements. Furthermore, peers' ability seems to have a stronger effect on students at the bottom of the grade distribution, especially at Age 16.
Subjects: 
peer effects
instrumental variables
test scores
JEL: 
I20
J24
Document Type: 
Working Paper

Files in This Item:
File
Size
194.98 kB





Items in EconStor are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.