Off-campus UNL users: To download campus access dissertations, please use the following link to log into our proxy server with your NU ID and password. When you are done browsing please remember to return to this page and log out.
Non-UNL users: Please talk to your librarian about requesting this dissertation through interlibrary loan.
Social capital, cultural capital, and parent involvement: Analyzing educational outcomes
Abstract
This study investigates the roles of social capital, cultural capital and parent involvement in predicting the educational outcomes of eighth grade students. Social capital exists in the relations among people and is essentially the benefit one gains from being connected to a social network. Cultural capital refers to the exposure to and knowledge of dominant norms, values, and rules of society. Historically, parent involvement in education has been measured by tapping involvement at the school building. Recognizing that parent involvement in education may manifest itself in different ways, three unique types of parent involvement, parent initiated contact with the school, school initiated contact with the parent, and parent interaction with students in the family, are measured in an attempt to better understand the parental influence on student outcomes. The 1988 National Education Longitudinal Study (NELS:88) provides data from 20,884 public school respondents. Stepwise multiple regression analysis tests the independent and mediating variables influencing grade point average (GPA). Several important mediating variables are analyzed including parent initiated contact, school initiated contact, social capital and cultural capital. The findings indicate that social capital, as measured by family interaction and help with homework, contributes significantly to predicting positive student outcomes in terms of grades. This study goes beyond the traditional status attainment model which concentrates heavily on socioeconomic status (SES). Still, SES remains a significant predictor of educational success. Implications of this study suggest that parents, teachers, school administrators, and educational researchers must develop new models of parent involvement which concentrate on parent/student interaction outside of the school setting. The quality of the parent/child relationship seems to drive many of the research findings. In order to best serve students, we need to understand the dynamics of the institutions within which they are spending many of their formative years undergoing educational and personal development.
Subject Area
Educational sociology|Families & family life|Personal relationships|Sociology
Recommended Citation
Anderson, Richard Harvey, "Social capital, cultural capital, and parent involvement: Analyzing educational outcomes" (1995). ETD collection for University of Nebraska-Lincoln. AAI9614978.
https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/dissertations/AAI9614978