Sibling study finds early education boosts brain power

To what extent has education really sharpen the mind?

A study published in the Journal of Human Capital Can help resolve this longtime debate by comparing adult brothers and sisters in Indonesia. Directed by Yuan Zhang, assistant professor of socioedical sciences at Robert N. Butler Columbia Aging Center of the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, research reveals the impact of education on adult cognition – especially for people from disadvantaged horizons.

Key conclusions

• Each additional year of education completed during the first nine years of schooling, has almost doubled the skills of quantitative reasoning and abstract for adults.
• The children of less educated mothers saw a great cognitive gain in basic education compared to peers with more educated mothers, but the advantages have decreased at higher levels of their own education. On the other hand, among the children of more educated mothers, the cognitive advantages of education were more consistent at all levels of education.
• These cognitive advantages are not ephemeral. Decades after the participants left school, those who have more education have maintained sharper quantitative skills and abstract reasoning capacities.

“Our study demonstrates the unique power of education to disrupt the cycles of disadvantage,” said Zhang. “This dividend for life underlines the role of education not only in the development of the child, but in the maintenance of cognitive health through the lifespan of adults. These results are a roadmap to reduce inequalities. Early investments in universal basic education pay double dividends – spirits further today and a healthier aging tomorrow.”

Study of brothers and sisters

The team has analyzed more than 20 years of data from Indonesian families with a remarkably high recontent rate. By comparing the brothers and sisters – who share genetics, parents and infantiles – isolated researchers The unique effects of education on quantitative and abstract reasoning distinct from family funds common to brothers and sisters.

“Imagine two brothers and sisters raised together,” explains Zhang. “If a sister ends the high school while her sister only finishes primary school, all cognitive differences between them in adulthood are probably due to these additional years of education – not family history.”

To validate this approach, the researchers carried out a placebo type test using the height, which schooling does not affect. While education initially seemed to be linked to the height during the comparison of individuals among the people studied, this connection disappeared during the comparison of the brothers and sisters – confirming the rigor of their method.

Additional co-authors of the article, entitled “Education and cognition for adults in a low-income setting: the differences between the adult brothers and sisters”, include Elizabeth Frankenberg, North Carolina University in Chapel Hill; And Duncan Thomas, Duke University.