19. The Statistics of Good Parenting

I just read a really enlightening study. In first reading it I was a little put off, but after really look at it I felt like the conclusion fit in well with my beliefs.

This study was a result of an economist, Steven Levitt, who did some statistical analysis based on data collected from a government survey of the Chicago Public School System in the nineties. The survey involved collecting information from a large demographic of children from their kindergarten year to their 5th grade year. This information included test scores and other academic measurements as well as information about the child's upbringing and family situation. What Dr. Levitt was seeking to analyze is correlation between the information of a child's upbringing and social situation with their test scores as a way of determining exactly what contributes to the success of children.

Surprisingly many factors that I thought would contribute to how successful a child would be showed no correlation--things like if parents were involved in the PTA or if they took their kids to museums or other cultural experiences. Factors that did correlate to children's success were parents salary, and if they're mother was over 30 years old when they had them. At first glass these results went against my beliefs of good parenting. Why wouldn't active parents--like the one's who go to museums with the kids and are in the PTA--not have more successful children then parents who are simply rich and old? There is an important statistical concept to consider in order to understand the conclusion of this study.

Correlation simply means that the two factors go together, not that one causes the other. Correlation tells us that snow and cold go together, but not whether snow causes it to be cold or if the cold causes snow. We do not know that mother's waiting until they are older to have children means that those kids will automatically be smart--only that older mothers typically have smarter kids. What can we draw from this? Well, older mother's are typically involved in education or a career and are also much more prepared to raise children than the average teen-pregnancy case. It would make sense that they would be able to raise more successful children. All that this teaches us is that parents who have succeeded in life are more likely to have successful children. They have worked hard to for their larger-than-average salary.

At first glance, this study looks like it's saying parents who do things for their kids (PTA museums) have no advantage over parents who are in better circumstances (more money, older), which is what had troubled me at first. The truth is almost the complete opposite. As we've seen, there are factors that contribute to the parents success. This study simply shows us that it's the things you've done before you have your kids that make you a successful parent. Doing things like PTA and museums will mean little if you are not a good parent to start off with (which is why they show no correlation). This fits in with my belief that good people make good parents. Guess I'd better get started now being a good person after all.