Test scores, noncognitive skills and economic growth

The Role of Noncognitive Skills in Explaining Cognitive Test Scores

This paper examines whether noncognitive skills – measured both by personality traits and economic preference parameters – influence cognitive tests performance. The basic idea is that noncognitive skills might affect the effort people put into a test to obtain good results. We experimentally varied the rewards for questions in a cognitive test to measure to what extent people are sensitive to ...

Noncognitive Skills, Occupational Attainment, and Relative Wages∗

This paper examines whether men’s and women’s noncognitive skills influence their occupational attainment and, if so, whether this contributes to the disparity in their relative wages. We find that noncognitive skills have a substantial effect on the probability of employment in many, though not all, occupations in ways that differ by gender. Consequently, men and women with similar noncognitiv...

Youth employment, unemployment, skills and economic growth

The Role of Cognitive and Noncognitive Skills in Overeducation

Over the past several decades, the issue of overeducation has attracted the attention of economists from many countries partly because overeducation appeared to be common and persistent. And yet, cognitive and noncognitive skills have not been systematically incorporated in the literature in spite of their importance in labor market outcomes. Using the National Education Longitudinal Study, thi...

How Do Shocks to Non-Cognitive Skills Affect Test Scores?

How Do Shocks to Non-Cognitive Skills Affect Test Scores? This paper investigates the extent to which test performance is affected by shocks to noncognitive skills. 440 students took a low stakes mathematics test. About half of them were exposed to positive affirmation while being given test instructions, whereas the other half served as controls. The students were allocated to 14 tutorials and...