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Everybody Needs Good Neighbours? Evidence from Students' Outcomes in England

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  • Gibbons, Stephen

    () (London School of Economics)

  • Silva, Olmo

    () (London School of Economics)

  • Weinhardt, Felix

    () (DIW Berlin)

Abstract

We estimate the effect of neighbours' characteristics and prior achievements on teenage students' educational and behavioural outcomes using census data on several cohorts of secondary school students in England. Our research design is based on changes in neighbourhood composition caused explicitly by residential migration amongst students in our dataset. The longitudinal nature and detail of the data allows us to control for student unobserved characteristics, neighbourhood fixed effects and time trends, school-by-cohort fixed effects, as well as students' observable attributes and prior attainments. The institutional setting also allows us to distinguish between neighbours who attend the same or different schools, and thus examine interactions between school and neighbourhood peers. Overall, our results provide evidence that peers in the neighbourhood have no effect on test scores, but have a small effect on behavioural outcomes, such as attitudes towards schooling and anti-social behaviour.

Suggested Citation

  • Gibbons, Stephen & Silva, Olmo & Weinhardt, Felix, 2011. "Everybody Needs Good Neighbours? Evidence from Students' Outcomes in England," IZA Discussion Papers 5980, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp5980
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    Cited by:

    1. Paul Bingley & Lorenzo Cappellari & Konstantinos Tatsiramos, 2014. "Family, Community and Long-Term Earnings Inequality," DISCE - Working Papers del Dipartimento di Economia e Finanza def017, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Dipartimenti e Istituti di Scienze Economiche (DISCE).
    2. Nicoletti, Cheti & Rabe, Birgitta, 2014. "Sibling spillover effects in school achievement," ISER Working Paper Series 2014-40, Institute for Social and Economic Research.
    3. Abigail Cooke & Thomas Kemeny, 2016. "Urban Immigrant Diversity and Inclusive Institutions," Working Papers 16-07, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    4. Figlio, D. & Karbownik, K. & Salvanes, K.G., 2016. "Education Research and Administrative Data," Handbook of the Economics of Education, Elsevier.
    5. Gibbons, Steve & Overman, Henry G. & Patacchini, Eleonora, 2015. "Spatial Methods," Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, Elsevier.
    6. Kenzo Asahi, 2014. "The Impact of Better School Accessibility on Student outcomes," SERC Discussion Papers 0156, Spatial Economics Research Centre, LSE.
    7. Essi Eerola & Tuukka Saarimaa, 2017. "Delivering Affordable Housing and Neighborhood Quality: A Comparison of Place- and Tenant-Based Programs," CESifo Working Paper Series 6674, CESifo Group Munich.
    8. Weinhardt, Felix, 2014. "Social housing, neighborhood quality and student performance," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 12-31.
    9. ., 2014. "Residential segregation and people sorting within cities," Chapters,in: Urban Economics and Urban Policy, chapter 3, pages 54-76 Edward Elgar Publishing.
    10. Mendolia, Silvia & Paloyo, Alfredo R. & Walker, Ian, 2016. "Heterogeneous Effects of High School Peers on Educational Outcomes," IZA Discussion Papers 9795, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).
    11. Thomas Kemeny & Abigail Cooke, 2018. "Spillovers from immigrant diversity in cities," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 18(1), pages 213-245.
    12. Abigail Cooke & Thomas Kemeny, 2016. "Immigrant Diversity and Complex Problem Solving," Working Papers 16-04, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    secondary schools; cognitive and non-cognitive outcomes; peer and neighbourhood effects;

    JEL classification:

    • C21 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Single Equation Models; Single Variables - - - Cross-Sectional Models; Spatial Models; Treatment Effect Models
    • I20 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - General
    • H75 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - State and Local Government: Health, Education, and Welfare
    • R23 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Household Analysis - - - Regional Migration; Regional Labor Markets; Population

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