Heterogeneous peer effects in education

•Investigate heterogeneous peer effects in education.•Focus on short-lived and long-lived peers.•Find long-term strong and persistent peer effects in education.•Peers influential in the long run only when their friendships last more than a year. We investigate whether, how, and why individual educat...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inJournal of economic behavior & organization Vol. 134; pp. 190 - 227
Main Authors Patacchini, Eleonora, Rainone, Edoardo, Zenou, Yves
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Elsevier B.V 01.02.2017
Subjects
2SLS estimation
Bayesian estimation
Education
Heterogeneous spillovers
Spatial autoregressive model
C31
D85
2SLS estimation
Bayesian estimation
Heterogeneous spillovers
Education
Spatial autoregressive model
Z13
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Summary:•Investigate heterogeneous peer effects in education.•Focus on short-lived and long-lived peers.•Find long-term strong and persistent peer effects in education.•Peers influential in the long run only when their friendships last more than a year. We investigate whether, how, and why individual education attainment depends on the educational attainment of schoolmates. Specifically, using longitudinal data on students and their friends in a nationally representative set of US schools, we consider the influence of different types of peers on educational outcomes. We find that there are strong and persistent peer effects in education, but peers tend to be influential in the long run only when their friendships last more than a year. This evidence is consistent with a network model in which convergence of preferences and the emergence of social norms among peers require long-term interactions.
ISSN:0167-2681
1879-1751
DOI:10.1016/j.jebo.2016.10.020