Socioeconomic Background and High School Completion: Mediation by Health and Moderation by National Context

• In Event: 523 - Section on Sociology of Education Refereed Roundtable Session and Business Meeting
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 21. Health and Education

Abstract

High school completion has become an increasingly important credential to gain access to large parts of the labor market. It is therefore particularly troublesome that a substantial amount of research has shown that adolescents from lower socioeconomic background are at higher risk than their more advantaged peers to leave high school without a diploma. Little attention has so far been paid to the role that adolescent health plays in the relationship between socioeconomic background and educational attainment. The present study uses longitudinal data from Norway (n=13262) and the United States (n=3604) to examine (1) whether adolescent health has a direct effect on successful high school completion, (2) whether health mediates the relationship between socioeconomic background and high school completion and (3) whether this mediated pathway varies by national context. Significant direct effects of health and mediation by health were found in both national samples. Specifically, results show that in both countries adolescents with better self-reported health are more likely to complete high school by age 21 than adolescents with poorer health. Furthermore, part of the tendency for lower socioeconomic adolescents to drop out of high school is explained by the negative effect that low socioeconomic background has on adolescents’ health which in turn reduces the chances of timely high school completion. Results further specify that this partial mediation effect is stronger in the United States than in Norway due to the stronger influence of parental education on both health and high school completion in the United States.

Authors

• Sharon Rodner Sznitman, School of Public Health

• Liza Reisel, Institute for Social Research

• Atika Khurana, College of Education, University of Oregon