Pub Date : 2025-11-01Epub Date: 2025-09-16DOI: 10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103240
Paul Y. Yoo , Thurston Domina , Andrew McEachin , Leah Clark , Hannah Hertenstein , Andrew M. Penner
Virtual charter schools are increasingly popular, yet there is little research on the long-term outcomes of virtual charter students. In this research note, we link statewide education records from 9th grade students in Oregon with information on criminal legal contact and IRS records containing earnings information housed at the U.S. Census Bureau to provide evidence on how virtual charter students fare as young adults. Virtual charter students have substantially worse high school graduation rates, college enrollment rates, bachelor's degree attainment, employment rates, and earnings than observationally similar students in traditional public schools, but similar rates of contact with the criminal legal system. Although there is growing demand for virtual charter schools, our results suggest that students who enroll in virtual charters may face negative long-term consequences.
{"title":"Virtual charter students have worse labor market outcomes as young adults","authors":"Paul Y. Yoo , Thurston Domina , Andrew McEachin , Leah Clark , Hannah Hertenstein , Andrew M. Penner","doi":"10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103240","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103240","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Virtual charter schools are increasingly popular, yet there is little research on the long-term outcomes of virtual charter students. In this research note, we link statewide education records from 9th grade students in Oregon with information on criminal legal contact and IRS records containing earnings information housed at the U.S. Census Bureau to provide evidence on how virtual charter students fare as young adults. Virtual charter students have substantially worse high school graduation rates, college enrollment rates, bachelor's degree attainment, employment rates, and earnings than observationally similar students in traditional public schools, but similar rates of contact with the criminal legal system. Although there is growing demand for virtual charter schools, our results suggest that students who enroll in virtual charters may face negative long-term consequences.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48338,"journal":{"name":"Social Science Research","volume":"132 ","pages":"Article 103240"},"PeriodicalIF":3.5,"publicationDate":"2025-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145104717","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-11-01Epub Date: 2025-08-02DOI: 10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103237
Micah H. Nelson
A large body of scholarship explores the various ways in which public opinion has become partitioned along party lines in the United States. This research broadly shows that Democrats and Republicans have grown more likely to disagree about many social and political issues, as evinced by increasing partisan differences in responses to attitude questions on surveys over time. This paper argues that this work may be grounded in an assumption that no longer holds water: that survey items measure the same constructs equivalently when administered to Democrats and Republicans. Rather, due to recent changes in the nature of partisan identity, members of the two parties have developed distinct processes of meaning-making, such that they can be prompted with the same survey questions, yet understand them in dissimilar ways that inhibit the comparability of their responses. This paper evaluates this hypothesis using measurement invariance tests of a wide range of scales administered on surveys conducted between 1992 and 2021. Results show that many attitude questions collected on recent surveys do not measure the same constructs equivalently among Democrats and Republicans. These findings suggest that estimates of the changing gap in social and political attitudes between the parties may be biased by partisan meaning-making, which differentially affects the measurement qualities of survey items in each group. More broadly, they imply a growing cultural divide between the parties, demarcated by a diminishing set of shared meanings about the world.
{"title":"Surveying the political divide: Public opinion in the era of partisan meaning-making","authors":"Micah H. Nelson","doi":"10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103237","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103237","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>A large body of scholarship explores the various ways in which public opinion has become partitioned along party lines in the United States. This research broadly shows that Democrats and Republicans have grown more likely to disagree about many social and political issues, as evinced by increasing partisan differences in responses to attitude questions on surveys over time. This paper argues that this work may be grounded in an assumption that no longer holds water: that survey items measure the same constructs equivalently when administered to Democrats and Republicans. Rather, due to recent changes in the nature of partisan identity, members of the two parties have developed distinct processes of meaning-making, such that they can be prompted with the same survey questions, yet understand them in dissimilar ways that inhibit the comparability of their responses. This paper evaluates this hypothesis using measurement invariance tests of a wide range of scales administered on surveys conducted between 1992 and 2021. Results show that many attitude questions collected on recent surveys do not measure the same constructs equivalently among Democrats and Republicans. These findings suggest that estimates of the changing gap in social and political attitudes between the parties may be biased by partisan meaning-making, which differentially affects the measurement qualities of survey items in each group. More broadly, they imply a growing cultural divide between the parties, demarcated by a diminishing set of shared meanings about the world.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48338,"journal":{"name":"Social Science Research","volume":"132 ","pages":"Article 103237"},"PeriodicalIF":3.5,"publicationDate":"2025-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144757723","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-11-01Epub Date: 2025-09-19DOI: 10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103252
Nicardo McInnis , Timothy Waidmann
Context
Social and economic conditions during childhood are linked with various outcomes in adulthood. Research shows that economic and health disparities arise early in life and get larger over time. However, little is known about the link between early life economic conditions and health during prime working ages.
Methods
We examine the long-term effects of local labor market conditions from birth to age 5 on health and risky health behaviors at prime working ages. We measure health outcomes using binary indicators of very good or excellent general health, the presence of physical limitations, and obesity. We measure risky behaviors through smoking status and alcohol consumption, including excessive drinking. We construct two versions of the Bartik instrument using data from the County Business Pattern and the Census to measure economic conditions during early childhood and link the Bartik indices to data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. We then use multivariate ordinary least squares regression to estimate the association between labor market conditions in childhood and outcomes in adulthood.
Findings
We find that better economic conditions in early childhood improve health in adulthood and reduce risky health behaviors. We also find important differences by parental education as well as by individuals’ race and gender. Additionally, we examine several potential pathways through which economic conditions might affect health and find evidence of increased paternal income and labor supply as well as higher individual educational attainment and earnings.
Conclusions
Our findings highlight the importance of early childhood economic environments for long-term health and development. They point to the value of policies that support families with children during periods of economic hardship. This includes programs like Unemployment Insurance, which directly address labor market disruptions, as well as income support policies such as the Earned Income Tax Credit and the Child Tax Credit, which can buffer the effects of reduced household resources. By mitigating the long-term consequences of adverse early-life conditions, such policies may improve not only health outcomes but also broader adult wellbeing.
{"title":"Effects of local labor market conditions at birth on later life health and health behaviors","authors":"Nicardo McInnis , Timothy Waidmann","doi":"10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103252","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103252","url":null,"abstract":"<div><h3>Context</h3><div>Social and economic conditions during childhood are linked with various outcomes in adulthood. Research shows that economic and health disparities arise early in life and get larger over time. However, little is known about the link between early life economic conditions and health during prime working ages.</div></div><div><h3>Methods</h3><div>We examine the long-term effects of local labor market conditions from birth to age 5 on health and risky health behaviors at prime working ages. We measure health outcomes using binary indicators of very good or excellent general health, the presence of physical limitations, and obesity. We measure risky behaviors through smoking status and alcohol consumption, including excessive drinking. We construct two versions of the Bartik instrument using data from the County Business Pattern and the Census to measure economic conditions during early childhood and link the Bartik indices to data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. We then use multivariate ordinary least squares regression to estimate the association between labor market conditions in childhood and outcomes in adulthood.</div></div><div><h3>Findings</h3><div>We find that better economic conditions in early childhood improve health in adulthood and reduce risky health behaviors. We also find important differences by parental education as well as by individuals’ race and gender. Additionally, we examine several potential pathways through which economic conditions might affect health and find evidence of increased paternal income and labor supply as well as higher individual educational attainment and earnings.</div></div><div><h3>Conclusions</h3><div>Our findings highlight the importance of early childhood economic environments for long-term health and development. They point to the value of policies that support families with children during periods of economic hardship. This includes programs like Unemployment Insurance, which directly address labor market disruptions, as well as income support policies such as the Earned Income Tax Credit and the Child Tax Credit, which can buffer the effects of reduced household resources. By mitigating the long-term consequences of adverse early-life conditions, such policies may improve not only health outcomes but also broader adult wellbeing.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48338,"journal":{"name":"Social Science Research","volume":"132 ","pages":"Article 103252"},"PeriodicalIF":3.5,"publicationDate":"2025-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145104542","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-11-01Epub Date: 2025-08-13DOI: 10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103234
Jon Overton, Gideon Cunningham
Dominant accounts of partisan polarization in political science and psychology posit that misunderstandings and mutual animosity drive conflict between Democrats and Republicans. Despite such high-profile tension, many Americans remain disengaged from politics. Using Identity Theory in sociology, we account for both rising polarization and persistent disengagement by turning attention to internal party dynamics. Partisan politics operates differently, depending on the political makeup of commonplace fixed social groups like sets of friends and coworkers. Partisan politics creates relatable common ground when social groups are politically homogeneous but creates tension in politically diverse small groups. Under these conditions, social similarity fosters more political activity generally (both normative and extreme), while deterring political engagement among those in politically diverse groups. Analyses of an original quota-sampled survey and a representative panel survey support expectations. Political homogeneity strengthens political identities, which produces more role-typical behaviors and extreme attitudes. These findings show how the desire to preserve relationships increases polarization, while also maintaining political disengagement.
{"title":"Groups activate identities; identities activate behavior: How political homogeneity breeds extremism and apathy in American politics","authors":"Jon Overton, Gideon Cunningham","doi":"10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103234","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103234","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Dominant accounts of partisan polarization in political science and psychology posit that misunderstandings and mutual animosity drive conflict between Democrats and Republicans. Despite such high-profile tension, many Americans remain disengaged from politics. Using Identity Theory in sociology, we account for both rising polarization and persistent disengagement by turning attention to <em>internal</em> party dynamics. Partisan politics operates differently, depending on the political makeup of commonplace fixed social groups like sets of friends and coworkers. Partisan politics creates relatable common ground when social groups are politically homogeneous but creates tension in politically diverse small groups. Under these conditions, social similarity fosters more political activity generally (both normative and extreme), while deterring political engagement among those in politically diverse groups. Analyses of an original quota-sampled survey and a representative panel survey support expectations. Political homogeneity strengthens political identities, which produces more role-typical behaviors and extreme attitudes. These findings show how the desire to preserve relationships increases polarization, while also maintaining political disengagement.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48338,"journal":{"name":"Social Science Research","volume":"132 ","pages":"Article 103234"},"PeriodicalIF":3.5,"publicationDate":"2025-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144827540","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-11-01Epub Date: 2025-09-06DOI: 10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103251
Maurice Gesthuizen, Michael Savelkoul, Peer Scheepers
Levels of exclusion of ethno-religious immigrants among the majority population vary strongly across European countries. This study addresses the question whether these variations are related to differences in immigrant integration policies and welfare policies across Europe. We argue that both policies need to be considered simultaneously, given the development of integration policies within historical frameworks of pre-existing welfare regimes, and expect that policies may set intergroup norms discouraging exclusion of ethno-religious immigrants. Additionally, we hypothesize that exclusionism-reducing impact of governmental policies might be weaker for people in economic precarious positions as compared to their more privileged counterparts, because people in such precarious positions face more intergroup competition. Using data from the European Social Survey, enriched with information on immigrant integration policies and welfare policies related to the labour market, our findings show that exposure to more welcoming integration policies is substantially and significantly negatively associated with exclusion of ethno-religious immigrants. However, this is not the case for welfare policies: although we also find a negative association with exclusion of ethno-religious immigrants, it is non-significant. Moreover, we find that the negative association between exposure to more welcoming integration policies and exclusion of immigrants is equally strong for people in precarious situations versus those in non-precarious situations.
{"title":"Excluding entire ethno-religious immigrant groups at the borders of European countries: Integration policies versus welfare policies","authors":"Maurice Gesthuizen, Michael Savelkoul, Peer Scheepers","doi":"10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103251","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103251","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Levels of exclusion of ethno-religious immigrants among the majority population vary strongly across European countries. This study addresses the question whether these variations are related to differences in immigrant integration policies and welfare policies across Europe. We argue that both policies need to be considered simultaneously, given the development of integration policies within historical frameworks of pre-existing welfare regimes, and expect that policies may set intergroup norms discouraging exclusion of ethno-religious immigrants. Additionally, we hypothesize that exclusionism-reducing impact of governmental policies might be weaker for people in economic precarious positions as compared to their more privileged counterparts, because people in such precarious positions face more intergroup competition. Using data from the European Social Survey, enriched with information on immigrant integration policies and welfare policies related to the labour market, our findings show that exposure to more welcoming integration policies is substantially and significantly negatively associated with exclusion of ethno-religious immigrants. However, this is not the case for welfare policies: although we also find a negative association with exclusion of ethno-religious immigrants, it is non-significant. Moreover, we find that the negative association between exposure to more welcoming integration policies and exclusion of immigrants is equally strong for people in precarious situations versus those in non-precarious situations.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48338,"journal":{"name":"Social Science Research","volume":"132 ","pages":"Article 103251"},"PeriodicalIF":3.5,"publicationDate":"2025-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145003547","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-11-01Epub Date: 2025-09-16DOI: 10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103256
Sandra N. Morgenstern
In the policy of migration information campaigns Western governments aim to influence perceptions on irregular migration in potential sending countries. While information campaigns are called the ‘ethical part’ of Western border politics, critical research literature questions their legitimacy due to anxiety-inducing messages, and the (lacking) credibility of Western implementers in the Global South. Drawing on dual-process theories from Psychology, and literature on credibility and emotions in politics, I expect that information provision moderated by anxiety and/or credibility are equally performing an information updating by enhancing the perception of the prevalence of irregular migration, but via different theoretical frames. To disentangle the independent and interdependent effects, I conducted a field experiment with two independent treatments in a real European migration information campaign reaching 2612 Nigerians. The overall information-effect results reveal an increased perception of irregular migration prevalence in ones surrounding, and a decrease in commonality of irregular migration when attributed to oneself. The moderators, credibility and anxiety, achieve similar levels per moderator and jointly but for distinct outcomes. If the credibility of the sender is assured, the perception of general topic prevalence is increased and only slightly changes the self-estimate, while anxiety-triggering enhances the self-attribution, i.e. own commonness of irregular migration and less so a general prevalence perception. The results support the two distinct paths of the theoretical dual-process framework. Additionally, by providing causal and multi-treatment evidence, this study contributes to a normative debate on the practical implementation of a migration policy, its purpose, and techniques in information transmission more broadly.
{"title":"Credibility and/or anxiety - The moderators of political information on migration","authors":"Sandra N. Morgenstern","doi":"10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103256","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103256","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>In the policy of migration information campaigns Western governments aim to influence perceptions on irregular migration in potential sending countries. While information campaigns are called the ‘ethical part’ of Western border politics, critical research literature questions their legitimacy due to anxiety-inducing messages, and the (lacking) credibility of Western implementers in the Global South. Drawing on dual-process theories from Psychology, and literature on credibility and emotions in politics, I expect that information provision moderated by anxiety and/or credibility are equally performing an information updating by enhancing the perception of the prevalence of irregular migration, but via different theoretical frames. To disentangle the independent and interdependent effects, I conducted a field experiment with two independent treatments in a real European migration information campaign reaching 2612 Nigerians. The overall information-effect results reveal an increased perception of irregular migration prevalence in ones surrounding, and a decrease in commonality of irregular migration when attributed to oneself. The moderators, credibility and anxiety, achieve similar levels per moderator and jointly but for distinct outcomes. If the credibility of the sender is assured, the perception of general topic prevalence is increased and only slightly changes the self-estimate, while anxiety-triggering enhances the self-attribution, i.e. own commonness of irregular migration and less so a general prevalence perception. The results support the two distinct paths of the theoretical dual-process framework. Additionally, by providing causal and multi-treatment evidence, this study contributes to a normative debate on the practical implementation of a migration policy, its purpose, and techniques in information transmission more broadly.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48338,"journal":{"name":"Social Science Research","volume":"132 ","pages":"Article 103256"},"PeriodicalIF":3.5,"publicationDate":"2025-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145104540","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Estimates of intergenerational educational mobility are generally computed using a combination of self- and proxy-reports of one’s and one’s parents’ education. Such reports are easily collected, offering a cost-effective alternative to collecting multiple self-reports or register data. However, the bias that proxy-reports could introduce in the measurement of intergenerational educational mobility is rarely assessed. Our study fills this gap and assesses how reliable people are when they report their parents’ or their child’s educational attainment. We find that both parents and children tend to underestimate the educational distance between themselves and their family members, thus inflating estimates of educational reproduction. This trend is larger when children act as proxy-reporters. Another limitation of using children’s proxy-reported information is the number of missing answers, which is lower when parents are asked to proxy-report their child’s education. In a simulation exercise, we establish that the bias introduced by proxy reports is not negligible, with self-reported intergenerational regression coefficients being 9% higher when a proxy-report is used.
{"title":"Who do they think you are? Inconsistencies in self- and proxy-reports of education within families","authors":"Chloé Lavest , Mathieu Ferry , Mathieu Ichou , Patrick Präg","doi":"10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103225","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103225","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Estimates of intergenerational educational mobility are generally computed using a combination of self- and proxy-reports of one’s and one’s parents’ education. Such reports are easily collected, offering a cost-effective alternative to collecting multiple self-reports or register data. However, the bias that proxy-reports could introduce in the measurement of intergenerational educational mobility is rarely assessed. Our study fills this gap and assesses how reliable people are when they report their parents’ or their child’s educational attainment. We find that both parents and children tend to underestimate the educational distance between themselves and their family members, thus inflating estimates of educational reproduction. This trend is larger when children act as proxy-reporters. Another limitation of using children’s proxy-reported information is the number of missing answers, which is lower when parents are asked to proxy-report their child’s education. In a simulation exercise, we establish that the bias introduced by proxy reports is not negligible, with self-reported intergenerational regression coefficients being 9% higher when a proxy-report is used.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48338,"journal":{"name":"Social Science Research","volume":"132 ","pages":"Article 103225"},"PeriodicalIF":3.5,"publicationDate":"2025-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144738732","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-11-01Epub Date: 2025-09-21DOI: 10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103250
Venkat Venkatasubramanian , Jessica Shi , Leo Goldman , E.M. Arun Sankar , Abhishek Sivaram
Contrary to the widely believed hypothesis that larger, denser cities promote socioeconomic mixing, a recent study reports the opposite behavior, i.e. more segregation. We present a behavioral microeconomics framework that predicts such segregation in multiclass systems. In our framework, every agent tries to maximize its effective utility, a measure of its socioeconomic benefit–cost trade-offs, by making choices about where to live and socialize. Our effective utility model incorporates well-known behavioral elements, such as homophily, congestion costs, venue option benefit, competition costs, and exploration vs. exploitation strategies. We prove that a population of such socioeconomic agents will reach an arbitrage equilibrium under certain general conditions. We derive the mathematical conditions that lead to social segregation. Our theory presents a micro-to-macro mathematical framework that connects individual preferences to neighborhood-level outcomes.
Our key insight is that socioeconomic segregation mechanisms operate differently at different population densities. In low-density environments, agents accept more socioeconomic diversity due to reduced homophily benefits. In high-density environments, the abundance of people and choices enables finer-grained sorting by socioeconomic traits. Furthermore, the arbitrage equilibrium outcome implies the equality of effective utilities among all agents. This intriguing result could be interpreted as all agents being equally “happy” in their respective environments, despite segregation, in our ideal society. This captures the essence of Rawlsian distributive justice and fairness. Our theory contributes towards a deeper philosophical and mathematical understanding of socioeconomic dynamics and behavior as we strive to create more harmonious societies.
{"title":"Arbitrage equilibrium in scale- and venue-mediated socioeconomic segregation: A behavioral microeconomics framework","authors":"Venkat Venkatasubramanian , Jessica Shi , Leo Goldman , E.M. Arun Sankar , Abhishek Sivaram","doi":"10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103250","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103250","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Contrary to the widely believed hypothesis that larger, denser cities promote socioeconomic mixing, a recent study reports the opposite behavior, i.e. more segregation. We present a behavioral microeconomics framework that predicts such segregation in multiclass systems. In our framework, every agent tries to maximize its effective utility, a measure of its socioeconomic benefit–cost trade-offs, by making choices about where to live and socialize. Our effective utility model incorporates well-known behavioral elements, such as homophily, congestion costs, venue option benefit, competition costs, and exploration vs. exploitation strategies. We prove that a population of such socioeconomic agents will reach an arbitrage equilibrium under certain general conditions. We derive the mathematical conditions that lead to social segregation. Our theory presents a micro-to-macro mathematical framework that connects individual preferences to neighborhood-level outcomes.</div><div>Our key insight is that socioeconomic segregation mechanisms operate differently at different population densities. In low-density environments, agents accept more socioeconomic diversity due to reduced homophily benefits. In high-density environments, the abundance of people and choices enables finer-grained sorting by socioeconomic traits. Furthermore, the arbitrage equilibrium outcome implies the equality of effective utilities among all agents. This intriguing result could be interpreted as all agents being equally “happy” in their respective environments, despite segregation, in our ideal society. This captures the essence of Rawlsian distributive justice and fairness. Our theory contributes towards a deeper philosophical and mathematical understanding of socioeconomic dynamics and behavior as we strive to create more harmonious societies.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48338,"journal":{"name":"Social Science Research","volume":"132 ","pages":"Article 103250"},"PeriodicalIF":3.5,"publicationDate":"2025-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145104719","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-11-01Epub Date: 2025-08-12DOI: 10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103239
Dieuwke Zwier
Many national education systems have schools that adopt distinctive elements like alternative pedagogical concepts or specialty themes. This “school profiling” is suggested to drive school segregation by socio-economic status (SES). Since most existing research has focused on U.S. charter schools and lacks large-scale student-level data, the connection between profiling and SES-based school sorting remains unclear. This study addresses this gap by focusing on the case of the Netherlands, a country known for its high school autonomy and freedom of school choice. I use population-wide register data from over 110,000 students (aged 11–12), linked to novel data on school profiling. The findings reveal social stratification in access to schools with distinctive profiles, with higher-SES students having access to a more diverse pool of schools. Furthermore, conditional logit models show evidence of self-sorting by SES for some profiles: for instance, schools with progressive learning concepts are less popular among lower-SES students, while higher-SES students are comparatively less likely to choose labor market-themed schools. These SES disparities, however, are modest and not always in the expected direction. Overall, findings underscore the role of access disparities in shaping SES-based sorting, next to differential preferences for schooling.
{"title":"Be true to your school: School profiling and school sorting by socio-economic status","authors":"Dieuwke Zwier","doi":"10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103239","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ssresearch.2025.103239","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Many national education systems have schools that adopt distinctive elements like alternative pedagogical concepts or specialty themes. This “school profiling” is suggested to drive school segregation by socio-economic status (SES). Since most existing research has focused on U.S. charter schools and lacks large-scale student-level data, the connection between profiling and SES-based school sorting remains unclear. This study addresses this gap by focusing on the case of the Netherlands, a country known for its high school autonomy and freedom of school choice. I use population-wide register data from over 110,000 students (aged 11–12), linked to novel data on school profiling. The findings reveal social stratification in access to schools with distinctive profiles, with higher-SES students having access to a more diverse pool of schools. Furthermore, conditional logit models show evidence of self-sorting by SES for some profiles: for instance, schools with progressive learning concepts are less popular among lower-SES students, while higher-SES students are comparatively less likely to choose labor market-themed schools. These SES disparities, however, are modest and not always in the expected direction. Overall, findings underscore the role of access disparities in shaping SES-based sorting, next to differential preferences for schooling.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48338,"journal":{"name":"Social Science Research","volume":"132 ","pages":"Article 103239"},"PeriodicalIF":3.5,"publicationDate":"2025-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144827541","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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