NimoErt – Non-monetary Outcomes of Education

Project Description

This interdisciplinary cooperative project focused on educational outcomes in three broader fields: health, non-cognitive skills, and social and political participation. At DIPF, we addressed research questions concerning the two first fields. Florian Schmiedek´s team focused on health as an educational outcome in the sub-project “well-being and time use”. Michael Becker and colleagues investigated non-cognitive skills in the sub-project “effects of the learning environment on non-monetary outcomes”.

Project Objectives

The sub-project “well-being and time use” addressed indicators for psychological health as outcomes of education. Using the Day Reconstruction Method (DRM), relations between educational background and the affective experience of daily activities were investigated in a national and representative subsample of the German Socio-Economic Panel Study (SOEP). The aims of this project were (1) to model affective well-being in everyday life in order to generate a better understanding of affective experiences, (2) to gain more information about affective well-being as an outcome of education, and (3) to investigate time use and time structuring of daily activities (e.g. working and leisure activities) of participants with different educational backgrounds.

In the sub-project “effects of the learning environment on non-monetary outcomes” we focused on effects of the student body composition on academic self-concept and later educational decisions after graduation from school (e.g. choice of college major). Research on school contextual effects has shown the importance of the learning environment for the self-assessment of abilities of the students (e.g. research on the big-fish-little-pond-effect). However, little was known about effects of student body composition on the educational career after graduation from school. Using a subsample of the BIJU-study, we focused on effects of the learning environment in school on educational careers after graduation from school. Hereby, the project investigated (1) the effects of student body composition on educational decisions such as choice of college major and (2) the relation of learning environment and less domain-specific variables such as self-esteem or life satisfaction.

Funding

Cooperations

• German Institute for Economic Research (DIW Berlin)
  
• Humboldt-Universität Berlin
• Universität Hamburg

Project Management

• Prof. Dr. Michael Becker
• Prof. Dr. Kai Maaz
• Prof. Dr. Florian Schmiedek

Project Details