The Contribution of Cognitive and Noncognitive Skills to Intergenerational Social Mobility

Psychol Sci. 2020 Jul;31(7):835-847. doi: 10.1177/0956797620924677. Epub 2020 Jun 30.

Abstract

We investigated intergenerational educational and occupational mobility in a sample of 2,594 adult offspring and 2,530 of their parents. Participants completed assessments of general cognitive ability and five noncognitive factors related to social achievement; 88% were also genotyped, allowing computation of educational-attainment polygenic scores. Most offspring were socially mobile. Offspring who scored at least 1 standard deviation higher than their parents on both cognitive and noncognitive measures rarely moved down and frequently moved up. Polygenic scores were also associated with social mobility. Inheritance of a favorable subset of parent alleles was associated with moving up, and inheritance of an unfavorable subset was associated with moving down. Parents' education did not moderate the association of offspring's skill with mobility, suggesting that low-skilled offspring from advantaged homes were not protected from downward mobility. These data suggest that cognitive and noncognitive skills as well as genetic factors contribute to the reordering of social standing that takes place across generations.

Keywords: general cognitive ability; noncognitive skills; open data; parent–offspring transmission; social mobility.

Publication types

  • Research Support, N.I.H., Extramural
  • Twin Study

MeSH terms

  • Academic Success
  • Adolescent
  • Adult Children / psychology*
  • Cognition / physiology*
  • Educational Status*
  • Female
  • Humans
  • Intergenerational Relations*
  • Male
  • Multifactorial Inheritance
  • Parents / psychology
  • Social Mobility*