A new study says that the Young children in lower-income
families who live in high-cost areas don't do as well academically as their
counterparts in low-cost areas, according to a new study.
The study, by researchers at Child Trends and the University
of California (UCLA), appears in the journal Child Development.
"Among families with incomes below 300 percent of
the federal poverty threshold -- that's below $66,339 for a family of four --
living in a region with a higher cost of living was related to lower academic
achievement in first grade," according to Nina Chien, a research scientist
with Child Trends, who coauthored the study.
"This is the first study to show that income isn't
enough," Chien added. "Cost-of-living differences also matter for children's
development, particularly for children from lower-income families."
Researchers used data from the Early Childhood
Longitudinal Study-Kindergarten Cohort, a nationally representative sample of
more than 17,500 children at more than 2,000 schools who started kindergarten
in 1998. They estimated the relation among such factors as cost of living,
family income, material hardship, parents' investments in their children's
educational activities, as well as assessments of parents' psychological well-being
(such as moms' reports of depressive symptoms and conflict in the marriage),
parenting practices (such as warmth and having routines), and school resources.
Researchers then looked at these factors in relation to
children's academic achievement (as measured by teachers' reports and tests of
how well the children read and did math), and social-emotional development (as
measured by teachers' reports of children's behavior problems and social
skills).
In addition to the pattern for all families with incomes
below 300 percent poverty, findings specific to families below 100 percent of
the federal poverty level pointed to further differences. Among children who
lived in families below 100 percent of the federal poverty threshold, those who
lived in a higher-cost area (compared to those in a lower-cost area) had
parents who made fewer investments in educational activities and went to
schools with fewer resources.
"This makes sense," Chien notes. "For poor
families already struggling to meet basic needs such as housing, utilities, and
food, living in a higher-cost area meant that families had little left over to
afford educationally enriching materials or activities for their
children."
Differences for lower-income families according to cost
of living in the area of residence held even when taking into account a
comprehensive set of demographic variables. The pattern was not seen in
children from more affluent families, suggesting that their academic
achievement wasn't as sensitive to cost-of-loving variations.
"Many government assistance programs are applied by
income and don't take into account variations in cost of living," Chien
notes. "Our findings suggest that poor and lower-income families living in
higher-cost areas may have a greater need for public assistance to offset the
higher costs of basic expenditures."
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