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What Do Books in the Home Proxy For? A Cautionary Tale

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  • Per Engzell

Abstract

In studies of educational achievement, students’ self-reported number of books in the family home is a frequently used proxy for social, cultural, and economic background. Absent hard evidence about what this variable captures or how well, its use has been motivated by strong associations with student outcomes. I show that these associations rest on two types of endogeneity: Low achievers accrue fewer books and are also prone to underestimate their number. The conclusion is substantiated both by comparing reports by students and their parents and by the fact that girls report on average higher numbers despite being similar to boys on other measures of social background. The endogenous bias is large enough to overturn classical attenuation bias; it distorts cross-country patterns and invalidates many common study designs. These findings serve as a caution against overreliance on standard regression assumptions and contribute to ongoing debates about the empirical robustness of social science.

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  • Per Engzell, 2021. "What Do Books in the Home Proxy For? A Cautionary Tale," Sociological Methods & Research, , vol. 50(4), pages 1487-1514, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:somere:v:50:y:2021:i:4:p:1487-1514
    DOI: 10.1177/0049124119826143
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    Cited by:

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    2. Lim, Youngshin & Park, Hyunjoon, 2022. "Who have fallen behind? The educational reform toward differentiated learning opportunities and growing educational inequality in South Korea," International Journal of Educational Development, Elsevier, vol. 92(C).
    3. Adrian Quintero & Emmanuel Lesaffre & Geert Verbeke, 2024. "Bayesian Exploratory Factor Analysis via Gibbs Sampling," Journal of Educational and Behavioral Statistics, , vol. 49(1), pages 121-142, February.

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