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The Relation Between Family Socioeconomic Status and Academic Achievement in China: A Meta-analysis

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Abstract

Academic achievement is one of the most important indicators for assessing students’ performance and educational attainment. Family socioeconomic status (SES) is the main factor influencing academic achievement, but the relation between SES and academic achievement may vary across different sociocultural contexts. China is the most populous developing country with a large number of schooling students in the basic education stage. Chinese schools are unified and managed by the Ministry of Education, but the central and local governments in accordance with their responsibilities share the investment of educational funds. However, the strength of the relation between SES and academic achievement and possible moderators of this relation remain unclear. Therefore, we conducted a meta-analysis on the relation between SES and academic achievement based on 215,649 students from 78 independent samples in the basic education stage from mainland China. The results indicated a moderate relation between SES and academic achievement (r = 0.243) in general. Moderation analyses indicated that the relation between SES and academic achievement gradually decreased in the past several decades; SES has a stronger correlation with language achievement (i.e., Chinese and English) than science/math achievement and general achievement. These findings were discussed from the perspective of governmental policies on education.

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Notes

  1. National Statistical Bulletin on the Development of Education (NSBDE 2016): http://www.moe.gov.cn/jyb_sjzl/sjzl_fztjgb/201707/t20170710_309042.html

  2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_population_(United_Nations)#cite_note-UN-3?tdsourcetag = s_pcqq_aiomsg

  3. (i) Chinese basic education includes preschool education, primary education, and general secondary education (middle school and high school). Among these levels, preschool education is mainly in kindergartens in cities, with a one- to three-year system. There are nine years in primary and middle schools, which fall under compulsory education, and three years in high schools. (ii) Chinese basic education has implemented a system of local responsibility and hierarchical management under the macro-guidance of the country. The Ministry of Education is responsible for formulating relevant laws, policies and overall development plans, stipulating compulsory course materials, supervising and guiding local education departments, etc. The county (city, district) government is primarily responsible for organizing compulsory education and implementation, managing education funds as a whole, and allocating and managing principals and teachers of primary and secondary education. (iii) Central and local governments share responsibilities for allocating Chinese education funds. Moreover, China makes educational transfer payments every year and has set up special funds to subsidize impoverished areas and ethnic minority areas and to subsidize areas where financial and educational expenditures are difficult.

  4. http://www.moe.gov.cn/jyb_sjzl/sjzl_fztjgb/201807/t20180719_343508.html

  5. https://baike.baidu.com/item/%E8%81%8C%E4%B8%9A%E9%AB%98%E4%B8%AD/8043090?fr=aladdin

  6. Data source: NBS, http://www.stats.gov.cn/tjsj/pcsj/

  7. Sampling year: if the studies provided an accurate sampling year, we used that date; if not, we calculated the sampling year by subtracting 2 from the publishing year (Hou et al. 2015).

  8. http://www.gov.cn/flfg/2006-06/30/content_323302.htm

  9. http://www.jledu.gov.cn/dd/wxzl/jyb/2005/0128/2627.html

  10. http://www.moe.gov.cn/jyb_zwfw/zwfw_fwxx/zhfu_zz/201708/t20170801_310467.html

  11. http://www.mof.gov.cn/zhengwuxinxi/caizhengxinwen/201712/t20171225_2787543.htm

  12. http://www.moe.gov.cn/jyb_xwfb/xw_zt/moe_357/jyzt_2018n/2018_zt18/zt1818_jgcx/dfcx/201809/t20180911_348207.html

  13. http://www.moe.gov.cn/jyb_xwfb/xw_fbh/moe_2069/xwfbh_2018n/xwfb_20181213/mtbd/201812/t20181214_363535.html

  14. https://data.worldbank.org/country/china, https://data.worldbank.org/country/united-states

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This work was supported by the Major Projects of National Social Science Fund of China (project number 16ZDA229).

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  1. Collaborative Innovation Center of Assessment Toward Basic Education Quality, Beijing Normal University, 306 Jingshixuetang Building, No.19, XinJieKouWai St., Haidian District, Beijing, 100875, China

    Juan Liu & Liang Luo

  2. Department of Special Education, The University of Texas at Austin, 1912 Speedway, Stop D5000, Austin, TX, 78712, USA

    Peng Peng

  3. Institute of Developmental Psychology, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, China

    Liang Luo

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Liu, J., Peng, P. & Luo, L. The Relation Between Family Socioeconomic Status and Academic Achievement in China: A Meta-analysis. Educ Psychol Rev 32, 49–76 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-019-09494-0

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