Parental Depression and Contextual Selection: The Case of School Choice

• In Event: Socio-Emotional Aspects of School Choice

Abstract

Parental depression constricts children’s development, but the mechanisms implicated remain largely unknown. Today, parents must evaluate and select environmental contexts for child-rearing within increasingly complex residential and educational markets. Depression may hamper parents’ abilities to navigate this terrain, constraining information collection and impairing child-oriented decision-making. In turn, their children may disproportionately lack access to the highest-quality K-12 schools – especially in the contemporary school choice environment, marked by proliferating non-traditional options and school quality data. Logistic regressions using Los Angeles Family and Neighborhood Survey data suggest depressed parents’ children are 40% less likely to attend a magnet, charter, or private school, and disparities appear largest among black families. School sorting thus emerges as a pathway linking parental depression to children’s prospects.

Author

• Jared Nathan Schachner, University of Chicago