Class differences in achievement- external factors

Sugarman

Argues that working-class parents pass on these beliefs and values to children by primary socialisation. Children internalise them resulting in underachieving. Differences in values stem from how middle-class jobs are secure careers offering prospects for continuous individual advancement encouraging ambition. Working-class jobs are less secure and have no structure where individuals can advance.

Argues that working-class subculture has four key features that act as a barrier to educational achievement:

• Fatalism: belief in fate. There is nothing you can do to change your status. This contrasts with middle-class values, emphasising that you can change your position through your efforts.

• Collectivism: valuing being part of a group more than succeeding as an individual. This contrasts with the middle-class view that group loyalties should not hold an individual back.

• Immediate gratification: seeking pleasure now rather than making sacrifices to get rewards in the future. Middle-class values emphasise deferred gratification.

• Present-time orientation: seeing the present as more important than the future and not having long-term goals or plans. Middle-class culture has a future-time orientation that sees planning as important.

Hubbs-Tait et al.

Found that parents use language that challenges their children to evaluate their understanding- cognitive performance improves.

Feinstein

Educated parents were more likely to use language in an evaluative way. Less educated parents use language in ways that only require children to make simple descriptive statements. Educated parents are more likely to use praise, encouraging children to develop a sense of their competence.

Troyna and Williams

Argue that the problem is not the child's language but the school's attitude to it. Teachers have a 'speech hierarchy': they label middle-class speech highest, followed by working-class speech and finally Black speech.

Bernstein

Identifies differences between the working and middle class language that influence achievement.

• Restricted code: limited vocabulary, grammatically simple sentences and speech is predicatable and there's a use of gestures.

• Elaborated code: wider vocabulary and based on longer, grammatically more complex sentences and communicates more abstract ideas.

Gaine and George

Cultural deprivation theories exaggerate the differences between classes. They criticise Bernstein for exaggerating and oversimplifying the differences between working-class and middle-class speech patterns, which have also probably reduced further since he conducted his research.

Douglas

Working-class parents placed less value on education. They were less ambitious for their children and gave less encouragement and interest in education. So, the children have lower levels of motivation and achievement.

Goodman and Gregg

Found parental involvement in their children's schooling was the most important factor affecting their achievement.

Feinstein 2

Similar to Goodman and Gregg. Argues that parents' educational level is the most important factor affecting children's achievement and, since middle-class parents tend to have higher qualifications, they can give their children an advantage by how they socialise them.

Bernstein and Young

Middle-class mothers were more likely to buy educational toys, books, and activities that stimulate intellectual development. Working-class parents are more likely to lack these resources so their children may start school without the skills needed to progress. Parents with higher qualifications also have better understanding of nutrition and its importance in child development.

Halsey and Whitty

Argue that compensatory education programmes have had little impact because few resources have been allocated to them.

Reay

Argues that while programmes often assume that working-class children fail as they lack aspiration, the true cause of underachievement is poverty and a lack of resources.

Victim blaming

It sees working-class students as lacking the cultural qualities needed for educational success. It ignores the inequalities built into the education system and wider society which are to blame for underachievement.

Keddie

Cultural deprivation is a 'myth' and victim-blaming explanation. A child cannot be deprived of their own culture. Working-class is culturally different, not deprived.

Labelling

Idea that cultural deprivation contributes to underachievement by acting as a negative label that teachers apply to working-class families. It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy that leads to failure for those labelled 'culturally deprived'

Evans

Most want children to do well at school as they know it will lead to a better job.

Blackstone & Mortimore

Working-class parents attend fewer parents' evenings not because of a lack of interest, but because they work longer or irregular hours.

Hanafin & Lynch

Found that parents took a keen interest in their children's education but felt excluded from decision-making by the school. Many parents want to help their child progress but lack the knowledge and education to do so.

Flaherty

Money problems in the family are a significant factor in younger children's non-attendance at school.

Howard

Young people from poorer homes have lower intakes of energy, vitamins and minerals. Poor nutrition affects health like weakening the immune system and lowering energy levels resulting in more absences.

Wilkinson

Among 10-year-olds, the lower their social class, the higher the rate of hyperactivity, anxiety and conduct disorders.

Blanden and Machin

Found that children from low-income families were more likely to engage in 'externalising' behaviour like fighting and tantrums.

Bull

Lack of financial support means that children from poor families have to do without equipment and miss out on experiences that would enhance educational achievement - 'the costs of free schooling'.

Tanner et al.

Found that the costs of items like transport, uniforms, books, computers, calculators, and sports, music and art equipment, places a heavy burden on poor families.

Smith and Noble

Adds that poverty acts as a barrier to learning in other ways like the inability to afford private schooling or tuition and poorer quality local schools.

Ridge

Children in poverty take on jobs like babysitting, and cleaning often having a negative impact on their schoolwork.

Callender and Jackson

Found that working-class students are more debt averse- they saw debt negatively and as something to avoid. They saw more costs than benefits in going to university. They found that attitude to debt was important in deciding to apply to university. Most debt-averse students were five times less likely to apply than most debt-tolerant students.

Reay - material

Found working-class students were more likely to apply to local universities so they could live at home and save on travel costs, but this gave them less opportunity to go to high-status universities.

Feinstein - material

Shows that educated parents make a positive contribution to a child's achievement, regardless of their income level.

Mortimore and Whitty

Material inequalities have the greatest effect on achievement.

Robinson

Tackling child poverty would be the most effective way to boost achievement.

Bourdieu

Cultural capital, educational and economic capital. Middle class is better placed to take advantage of choices offered in education system

Leech and Campos

Coventry study- Middle-class parents are more likely to afford a house in school catchment area that is highly placed on exam tables. 'Selection by mortgage' because it drives up cost of houses near a successful school and excludes working-class families.

Sullivan

Used questionnaires to conduct a survey of 465 pupils in four schools. Those who read complex fiction and watched serious TV documentaries developed a wider vocabulary and greater cultural knowledge indicating greater cultural capital. But, cultural capital only accounted for part of the class difference in achievement. Greater resources and aspirations of middle-class families explain the remainder of the class gap in achievement.