Children from poorer families believe they are less academically competent than their peers from wealthier backgrounds, according to new research from the Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI).
The report shows children from low socio-economic status (SES) backgrounds finish primary school with lower perceptions of their own competence and worth within academic contexts. These feelings intensify in secondary school.
The ESRI examined post-school outcomes of young people who experienced different levels of economic vulnerability during childhood. The study was informed using longitudinal data on 8,500 children in Ireland from the 1998 cohort of the Growing Up in Ireland (GUI) study. Economic vulnerability is defined as a measure “combining income poverty, economic stress and material deprivation”.
Data from three waves of GUI was collected from the young people at ages nine, 13 and 20 between 2007 and 2018, and also from their primary caregivers and schools.
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The study found a rise in parental educational expectations, which occurs typically during the transition from primary to secondary school, was not likely to be the case for low-SES parents.
“Academic self-concept” is a term that refers to the students’ perceptions of their own competence and worth within academic contexts. Patterns of academic self-concept and parental expectations were found to predict educational attainment in children seven years later. Parents’ expectations during this period were especially influential for children from low SES families.
The research shows that even when low-SES parents have high expectations, these students need positive teacher relationships to reach the same attainment levels (a third-level degree) as their high-SES peers.
For children from high-SES backgrounds, the quality of teacher-child interaction can play a compensatory role in the context of low parental expectations. These children were shown to benefit from having at least one good adult relationship, whether it was with a teacher or a parent.
Authors of the paper, published in the British Journal of Educational Psychology, highlighted the importance of boosting children’s academic self-concepts in primary school and supporting high expectations among their parents.
They concluded that these efforts, alongside promoting positive school climates, are “essential in supporting the educational careers of all young people”, regardless of their background.
Educational inequality is targeted in Ireland through the Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools (DEIS) programme. This provides support to schools with a high concentration of disadvantage, such as additional classroom teaching posts, home-school community coordinator posts and school-completion programme.
The socio-economic gap in educational attainment is narrower in Ireland than the average across OECD countries, according to a 2024 review. However, it noted that differences in outcomes persist for pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds, as well as Traveller and Roma students.
Improvements to capacity and resourcing in primary and post-primary schools were identified among key areas in need of attention to help address the disparity.
