Cultural capital and its effects on education outcomes

In this study we distinguished between two forms of cultural capital, one that is static, representing the highbrow activities and practices of parents, and one that is relational, representing cultural interactions and communication between children and their parents. We used data for 28 countries from the 2000 Programme for International Student Assessment to examine whether these two types of cultural capital were associated with students’ reading literacy, sense of belonging at school, and occupational aspirations, after controlling for traditional measures of socioeconomic status. We examined whether one type of cultural capital had stronger effects than the other and whether their effects differed across outcomes and across countries. The results provide compelling evidence that dynamic cultural capital has strong effects on students’ schooling outcomes, while static cultural capital has more modest effects.