Do Birth Order Effects on Secondary School Track Placement Differ Between Natives and Migrants? A Within-Family Analysis in the German Educational System

Bibliographic Data

ID2234871
AuthorsTobias Roth (0000-0001-9742-8297, Data and Research on Society, GESIS Leibniz-Institute for the Social Sciences, Mannheim 68159, Germany), Klaus Pforr (0000-0002-6300-8224, Data and Research on Society, GESIS Leibniz-Institute for the Social Sciences, Mannheim 68159, Germany), Sandra Mingham (Data and Research on Society, GESIS Leibniz-Institute for the Social Sciences, Mannheim 68159, Germany), Meike Selbach (Data and Research on Society, GESIS Leibniz-Institute for the Social Sciences, Mannheim 68159, Germany)
Year2022
Volume38
Issue3
Pages440-454
Publication date2022-05-24
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueEuropean Sociological Review (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0266-7215 • E-ISSN: 1468-2672
PublisherOxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1093/esr/jcab047
OpenAlexW3205828098
LanguageEN
Citations received2
References cited42

While existing research has found negative birth order effects on competences and educational attainment in various Western countries with different educational systems, it is unclear whether these findings also hold in families with migration background. We argue that in migrant families where children were born in the host country, birth order effects on secondary school track placement should be weak or even reversed. In these families, parents' host country-specific resources and knowledge of the education system are likely to be comparatively low. Consequently, older siblings who were born and educated in the host country can be an important source of information and support on educational matters for their younger siblings. Moreover, parental knowledge of the education system should increase with the educational career of each of their children. Family fixed-effects models based on representative data from the German Microcensus show negative birth order effects on secondary school track placement for native, first-generation migrant, and interethnic siblings, but not for second-generation migrant siblings. The empirical results indicate that negative birth order effects are not necessarily universal, but that children may even benefit from having older siblings under certain conditions

Birth order · Demographic economics · Developmental psychology · Economic growth · Economics · Educational attainment · Geography · German · Order (exchange) · Population · Sociology · Cognitive Abilities and Testing · Demographic Trends and Gender Preferences · Demography · Intergenerational and Educational Inequality Studies · Psychology