Dimensions of Parenting Style: Parental Income, Parenting Behaviors, and Children’s Cognitive Skill Scores

• In Event: 037 - Regular Session. Social Stratification and Inequality: Structure and Determinants

Abstract

Parenting behaviors are often posited as the key factor linking parental income with children’s life and economic outcomes, but specific mechanisms and causal directions are disputed. Some theories argue that parental income affects children’s outcomes through parenting behaviors, but others argue income is merely a correlate of parenting behaviors. Further, a variety of specific parenting variables—enrichment expenditures, cognitive stimulation, parental stress, and parental school involvement—have been proposed as the primary mechanisms influencing child outcomes. This study assesses these causal explanations and posited mechanisms by examining cross-time associations between family income, parenting behaviors, and children’s cognitive skills, through OLS regressions with three time waves of data. Using the Panel Study of Income Dynamics Child Development Survey, which provides rich longitudinal data on a variety of parenting behaviors and educational expenditures, this study found support for a model in which cognitive stimulation partially mediated the relationship between income and children’s cognitive skills. Other parenting behaviors, including enrichment expenditures, parental stress, and parental school involvement, were associated with income but were not significantly related to children’s cognitive skills.

Authors

• Christopher Near, University of Michigan

• Yu Xie, University of Michigan