A Crossnational Analysis of Parental Involvement and Student Literacy

1
A Cross-national Analysis of Parental Involvement
and Student Literacy

• Lina Guzman1,
• Gillian Hampden-Thompson2,
• and Laura Lippman1
• International Society for Child Indicators
  Conference
• June 28, 2007
• 1 Child Trends
• 2 American Institutes of Research

2
Background

• Researchers at Child Trends are interested in
  family strengths, conceptualized as behaviors,
  processes, and relationship characteristics that
  support family functioning and foster well-being.
• Family strength is promoted through activities
  such as spending time together, communicating,
  and participating in a variety of cultural and
  educational activities.
• Participation in these activities is a more
  direct measure of parenting, in contrast to proxy
  measures such as family structure and income.
• U.S. studies have found that these aspects of
  parent involvement are related to positive
  outcomes such as literacy.

3
Research questions

• Does parent involvement vary across countries?
• Is there a consistent relationship between parent
  involvement and literacy across countries?
• Does the relationship vary by type of literacy
  (reading, math, or science)?
• Is the relationship between parent involvement
  and literacy stronger or weaker in the U.S. than
  in other countries?

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Program for International Student Assessment
(PISA)

• OECD study conducted in 43 countries
• Assess 15-year-olds literacy in reading, math,
  and science
• Literacy everyday knowledge rather than
  curricular-based learning
• Data collection occurs every three years,
  focusing on one subject area per cycle
• Current study utilizes 2000 data from 21
  countries
• represents advanced industrialized countries
  comparable to the U.S.
• geographic regions of North America, Western and
  Eastern Europe (including Russia), and the
  Pacific
• 2000 wave used because it contained the parent
  involvement measures (which were dropped in later
  years)

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PISA countries in the current analysis
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Parent involvement measures

• As part of the assessment, students were asked
  about
• Social Communication
• Eating meal with parent
• Talking generally with parent
• Cultural Communication
• Discussing books, films, or television with
  parent
• Discussing political or social issues with parent
• Educational involvement
• Parental help with homework

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Theoretical framework
8
Methodology

• Outcomes Assessment scores for reading, math,
  and science literacy
• Predictors Three types of parental involvement
• Analysis
• OLS regression estimate relationship between
  parental involvement and three literacy domains
  for each country
• HLM compare relationship between parental
  involvement and literacy across countries

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Communication across countries

• First, does the frequency of communication
  between parents and 15-year-olds, as well as the
  extent of homework assistance, vary across
  countries?
• The frequency of communication activities is
  similar across countries
• Eating meals (most frequent communication
  activity)
• Discussing general issues
• Discussing political or social issues
• Discussing books, films, or television (least
  frequent communication activity)
• The frequency with which parents help with
  homework varies more across countries than the
  communication activities

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Eating meals
Several times a week
Several times a month
Once a month
Few times a year
Never
Note Graph reflects unweighted means
11
Discussing general issues
Several times a week
Several times a month
Once a month
Few times a year
Never
Note Graph reflects unweighted means
12
Discussing political or social issues
Several times a week
Several times a month
Once a month
Few times a year
Never
Note Graph reflects unweighted means
13
Discussing books, films, or television
Several times a week
Several times a month
Once a month
Few times a year
Never
Note Graph reflects unweighted means
14
Homework assistance
Several times a week
Several times a month
Once a month
Few times a year
Never
Note Graph reflects unweighted means
15
Literacy across countries

• Reading literacy
• Higher scores than math and science
• Range 462 to 549
• Math literacy
• Range 447 to 538
• Science literacy
• Range 460 to 538

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Reading literacy across countries
17
Math literacy across countries
18
Science literacy across countries
19
Social communication and reading literacy across
countries

• At least one measure of social communication
  (eating meals together and general talking) is
  positively related to reading literacy in 20
  countries (all except Italy).
• Eating meals together is significantly associated
  with higher literacy in 16 countries.
• Talking about general topics has a less
  consistent relationship with reading literacy,
  but is still significantly related to higher
  literacy in 11 countries.

20
Cultural communication and reading literacy
across countries

• Discussions about books, film, or TV are
  positively (and significantly) related to reading
  literacy in 20 countries (all except New
  Zealand).
• Discussions about political or social issues is
  positively and significantly associated with
  higher reading literacy in all 21 countries.

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Homework help and reading literacy across
countries

• Frequent homework help is significantly related
  to lower levels of reading literacy in all 21
  countries.
• OLS coefficients range from -6.10 to -15.89
• The relationship is strongest in Australia,
  Sweden, the U.K., and the U.S. (meaning more
  parental help was associated with even lower
  reading literacy).
• The relationship is weakest in Portugal and
  Spain.
• This finding corroborates other research
• Suggests that students who need more help have
  parents who are more involved with helping them.

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Do relationships vary by subject?

• The relationships between parent involvement and
  literacy are in the same direction, but are less
  consistent for math and science literacy.
• Engaging in political and social discussions and
  eating with parents are both consistently
  associated with higher literacy in all three
  domains.
• Discussing general issues and books, etc. are
  also associated with higher literacy, though not
  as frequently as other forms of communication.
• However, the relationship between parental
  involvement and literacy is most consistent and
  strongest with reading.
• For example, discussing books, films, and TV is
  related to higher reading literacy in 20
  countries, higher math literacy in 7 countries,
  and higher science literacy in 12 countries.

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Cross-national relationship between parent
involvement and literacy

• The relationship is relatively consistent across
  the 21 countries. Net of family background and
  SES, students in most countries who have higher
  levels of social and cultural communications with
  their parents have higher literacy levels in all
  three subjects.
• Parental help with homework is related to lower
  literacy, which is likely indicative of parental
  response to lower achievement.
• U.S. compared to other countries in the
  relationship between parent involvement and
  reading literacy
• U.S. adolescents benefit less (in terms of the
  effect of communication on literacy) from eating
  with a parent and from political and social
  discussions.
• U.S. adolescents benefit more from discussing
  books, films, and television.
• General discussion has the same effect.

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Conclusions

• Parental involvement in the specific form of
  social and cultural communication is associated
  with higher literacy among 15-year-olds in the
  majority of countries.
• Parental communication is positively related to
  literacy across countries, though more so for
  reading literacy than for math and science.
• Homework help is inversely related to literacy,
  corroborating prior research.
• Students benefit from varied and multiple types
  of communication. General discussion is not as
  consistently related to higher literacy,
  therefore parents need to be encouraged to talk
  about specific topics of discussion.
• Talking to kids about books, film, and even
  television, or discussing political or social
  issues, has a greater effect than just eating
  together and more general conversation.