Primary and secondary social background effects at different points of transition in the education system
General and Domain-Specific Teaching and Learning
Final Report Abstract
The MILES-HuGS project served to gain deeper insights into the research field of primary and secondary effects of social origin according to Raymond Bourdon’s theory, explicitly for the German school context. The concept of researching inequalities in educational transitions was theoretically expanded by addressing not only educational decisions but also attained school leaving qualifications. Moreover, the concept was empirically and comparatively analyzed across the entire secondary school trajectory. The social background effect was decomposed for the first time for central transition points in the German secondary school system, i.e. into primary effects (achievement differentials) and secondary effects (educational decisions), by means of the recently established KHB method. The findings contribute to the state of research in national and international educational research. Existing findings are validated and expanded. Based on the student achievement studies LAU (from 1996 to 2005) and KESS (from 2003 to 2012), a comparative assessment of students in the Hamburg school system was run for the entire student cohorts across secondary education. It allowed both cross sectional and longitudinal analyses within and across cohorts. In line with the state of research, the total social background effect decreased across the educational career from the transition from primary to secondary school to the transition to higher education. This concerns the specific student body at the various transition points (at the end of primary, lower secondary, and upper secondary education, respectively). However, when focusing on the (unselected) entire population from the end of primary education, a statistically significant steady decline of social inequalities emerged only until transition to upper secondary education. The total background effect also decreased when comparing (longitudinally) the transition to secondary school and the attainment of a university entrance certificate (Abitur). The decomposition into both effects resulted in relative weights of primary and secondary effects up to the transition to upper secondary education which approximately balanced out each other. These analyses revealed as well, that if primary effects were operationalized via objective test results instead of school grades, an underestimation of secondary effects can be avoided. From a longitudinal perspective, the relative importance of secondary effects regarding Abitur graduation was only slightly larger compared to the transition to the academic track because early existing social disparities in achievement at the end of primary school – as a long-term primary effect – explained significant amounts. Secondary effects only gained substantial predominance at the transition to higher education in terms of the intention to study. This concerns the entire population – as was analyzed for the first time – and the respective Abitur graduates (where it was clearly more evident). A comparison of LAU and KESS showed a decrease of secondary effects regarding the transition to the academic track due to of the expansion of upper secondary graduation rates. At the same time, a slight increase of the relative importance of secondary effects can be observed for transitions to tertiary education (both times, the absolute effects were similar).
Publications
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(2020). Primäre und sekundäre Herkunftseffekte über den Verlauf der Sekundarstufe: Eine Dekomposition an drei Bildungsübergängen. Zeitschrift für Erziehungswissenschaft, 23(6)
Scharf, J., Becker, M., Stallasch, S. E., Neumann, M., & Maaz, K.
