Why do children from bigger families tend to do worse in school than children from smaller families?

Question

Check out this research study:

"Although the inverse relationship between the number of siblings and children's educational performance has been well established, explanations for this relationship remain primitive. One explanation, resource dilution, posits that parents have finite levels of resources (time, energy, money, etc.) and that these resources are diluted among children as sibship size increases. I provide a more rigorous investigation of the dilution model than previous studies, testing its implications with a sample of 24,599 eighth graders from the 1988 [U.S.] National Education Longitudinal Study. My analyses support the resource dilution model in three ways..."

from http://www.popline.org/docs/1138/250567.html

Author(s):

Downey DB

Source citation:

AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICAL REVIEW, 1995 Oct;60(5):746-61.

Answer 1

That was one source, one study.

What a crock of sh*t. Look around, it's not that way. That person may have had an agenda and it was a biased study. Don't believe everything you read.

I come from a large family and everyone is highly intelligent and doing quite well.

Answer 2

I think the answer is close to what the study says, resources get diluted the more kids you have. It's just like filling up a classroom, the more kids in there the more likely some will fall through the cracks. If a child is failing in school, a parent is more likely to notice it if they only have the one child than if they have 5 others to take up their attention. This is obviously not true in every family and there are plenty of large families that do very well. It would be interesting if the study attempted to correlate demographics as well.

Answer 3

As the mother of 9 kids I find that study to be a crock of $#!%.
Of my 9 kids, 4 have graduated high school to date all being in the top 2% of their class. Those 4 all attended or are attending collge. One already graduated magna *** laude, the other 3 are all on the presidents list. All 4 had full academic scholarships and schools fighting over them. I have 2 in high school, both are straight A students. One graduating this week has an appointment to Annapolis.
My middle schooler are elementary schooler are both straight A students and in the gifted programs for their respective schools. My youngest (just turned 5) goes to a German kindergarten where she has become bilingual, and was reading age 4. Aside from my 5 year old I have three other children that are bilingual. 2 in spanish and the other 1 in German also. (Just in case you are thinking, neither my husband or I speak a second language other than a few words or phrases). My family is not alone either, we know lots of kids from large families that are equally smart. We also know plenty of kids from small or even only child families that have kids that perform poorly in school despite the parents being smart.

In my opinion any one can find just about any finding they are looking for to support a thesis.

Answer 4

That test was in 1988. We're in 2007 now. Also, define bigger. You can have a bigger family and a sense of family. You can have a smaller family and a sense of isolation. Just because you're in a bigger family does not mean you your self will do worse in school. Remember, your family only gives you genetic traits (and even that is only done by your immediate parents). For everything else, you plan, you decide.

Answer 5

today's society almost requires that large families survive by both parents contributing monetarily to the household. ofttimes, this requires both parents being away from home. children slip through the cracks, so to speak, because they are often closer in age, and after all of the daily activity is done, there seems not to be enough time to go around. money is tighter, and there's not enough to go around, no matter how much you do without. say that after dinner and bathtime, parents have a combined 3.5 hours to devote to schoolwork. with one child, the child gets 3.5 devoted hours. if there are 2 children, the children get a total of 1.75 hours devoted time each. see the pattern?

this is not to say that it always happens. it has, however, become a trend. it's not that parents don't care, but circumstances remove them from the situation at times. children fight for attention, for time, and for money. however, this does not always have a negative impact on children. it is research done to explain a growing trend.

Answer 6

This is not always the case.

My husband ( the youngest of 6 ) is very secure and smart ... he has not lacked in education at all. he's Top of his class.

I think in your message it deals with parents who believe that their older siblings should be the ones to take care of younger ones.
Personally, I believe ALL children should learn to be Children. There will be a Time when those children will grow up .. THEN it's time for them to become adults and to grow in adult life hood.

Answer 7

Devote a year of care $#@$WHAT

For the work the SAH parents do, cleaning the house, making meals, running errands, thats not really devotion. Before there was any such thing as SAH parents, mothers and fathers were out farming, foraging for seeds and berries, and older siblings (some times not by much) and elders were caring for the young children - much like daycare.

As for the original question, I wonder if it more has to do with a "fitting in" mentality. Such as that a "brainiac" might be seen as a negative thing.

Theory #2, is that to have a bigger family, you often need a bigger house, which is more affordable in areas which may not have as quality of schools. Lots of small farming communities only offer algebra as their highest math.

Answer 8

that is not always true my best friend is from a family of nine children and she just received her degree in business administration all of her siblings have graduated high school except three and that is because they are still in and all of them attended college so it all depends on the family composition not the size if everyone works together to support each other then everyone will do fine

Answer 9

:shrug:

Studies & statistics don't make a family - don't affect or accurately show how individual people are leading their lives.

And, correlation can be found anywhere - check out this graph that 'proves' that the declining pirate population is causing global warming: http://www.venganza.org/images/spreadword/pchart1.jpg

Answer 10

It is not ALWAYS true!!!

BUT it COULD be the LIMITED amount of time each parent MAY have to spend with each child to help with school work!

But it is NOT ALWAYS true!!!!

I have a friend who is the oldest of five and she and her siblings do VERY well in school.

Also my fiance was the youngest of six, with the exception of the oldest who has a mental disability, they all did VERY well in school!

I grew up with one sister and I could have done better in school if I had help with my school work. My mom refused to help us!!! I usually got help from my grandma's best friend when she could!!!