Asian children’s verbal development: A comparison of the United States and Australia

• We study White-Asian differences in verbal development during childhood.
• Asian Americans start school with higher scores than Whites, but their advantage erodes over time.
• Asians in Australia start school with lower scores, but they “catch-up” to Whites.
• The initial advantage of Asian Americans arises due to their parent’s SES advantage.
• Asians in Australia “catch-up” because of their parent’s educational advantage.

Using longitudinal cohort studies from Australia and the United States, we assess the pervasiveness of the Asian academic advantage by documenting White-Asian differences in verbal development from early to middle childhood. In the United States, Asian children begin school with higher verbal scores than Whites, but their advantage erodes over time. The initial verbal advantage of Asian American children is partly due to their parent’s socioeconomic advantage and would have been larger had it not been for their mother’s English deficiency. In Australia, Asian children have lower verbal scores than Whites at age 4, but their scores grow a faster rate and converge towards those of Whites by age 8. The initial verbal disadvantage of Asian Australian children is partly due to their mother’s English deficiency and would have been larger had it not been for their Asian parent’s educational advantage. Asian Australian children’s verbal scores grow at a faster pace, in part, because of their parent’s educational advantage.