Pubertal Timing and Inequalities in Education

Within a typical classroom, the onset of puberty occurs four years earlier for the first developing girl than for the latest developing boy. However, it is not clear how these large inter-personal differences affect school performance and educational trajectories, with previous studies finding negative effects of both early and late pubertal timing on school performance. This project therefore aims to provide new knowledge on how variation in pubertal timing affects school performance during adolescence and inequalities in education later in life, and to assess policies that could mitigate adverse consequences of such relationships. To this end, we will use data from Norway and Denmark that combine cohort studies with extensive register data in both countries. We will use height-based measures of puberty and questions about sexual maturity from the Norwegian Mother, Father and Child Cohort Study (MoBa) and the Danish National Birth Cohort (DNBC) as well as diagnosed pubertal disorders, linked to school performance from national registers. We will study how early or late pubertal timing is associated with school performance, whether these associations depend on early childhood development and peer context, and whether pubertal timing relates to educational choices. Furthermore, we will consider whether an extra school year in Denmark mitigates adverse consequences of pubertal timing for educational achievement, and whether education was affected by the introduction and abolishment of an extra school year after lower secondary school in Norway. With a longer perspective, we will study how age at menarche has evolved over almost 100 years using MoBa and the Cohort of Norway study, and assess how it relates to socioeconomic background during the last half century. This data will also be used to study how age at menarche is related to educational attainment of women and school performance in the next generation.

Within a typical classroom, the onset of puberty occurs four years earlier for the first developing girl than for the latest developing boy. However, it is not clear how these large inter-personal differences affect school performance and educational trajectories, with previous studies finding negative effects of both early and late pubertal timing on school performance. This project therefore aims to provide new knowledge on how variation in pubertal timing affects school performance during adolescence and inequalities in education later in life, and to assess policies that could mitigate adverse consequences of such relationships. To this end, we will use data from Norway and Denmark that combine cohort studies with extensive register data in both countries. We will use height-based measures of puberty and questions about sexual maturity from the Norwegian Mother, Father and Child Cohort Study (MoBa) and the Danish National Birth Cohort (DNBC) as well as diagnosed pubertal disorders, linked to school performance from national registers. We will study how early or late pubertal timing is associated with school performance, whether these associations depend on early childhood development and peer context, and whether pubertal timing relates to educational choices. Furthermore, we will consider whether an extra school year in Denmark mitigates adverse consequences of pubertal timing for educational achievement, and whether education was affected by the introduction and abolishment of an extra school year after lower secondary school in Norway. With a longer perspective, we will study how age at menarche has evolved over almost 100 years using MoBa and the Cohort of Norway study, and assess how it relates to socioeconomic background during the last half century. This data will also be used to study how age at menarche is related to educational attainment of women and school performance in the next generation.