Karl Vachuska, Graduate Student, Sociology, UW-Madison

Title: The effect of college attendance on mid-life cognitive outcomes: A causal decomposition approach using the High School and Beyond data

Abstact: This study investigates the potential role of baccalaureatecollege attendance in mitigating inequities in cognitive function in midlifethat are rooted in social origins. Using data from the High School and Beyondstudy, we apply Yu and Elwert’s (2023) framework to causally decomposecognitive outcomes between those who had at least one parent who obtained abaccalaureate degree and those who did not) into components attributable tosample members’ college attendance and components not attributable to theircollege attendance. Fundamentally, our analysis estimates how disparities inmidlife cognitive function would shift if college attendance was assignedindependent of social origin. We find that college attendance explainsapproximately 20% of the difference in average mid-life cognition of childrenwhose parents did and did not attend college—and almost entirely throughdifferential college attendance rates between the two groups rather than thedifference in the effects of attendance or the process of selection.

Bill Carbonaro, Professor, Sociology, University of Notre Dame
https://sociology.nd.edu/people/william-carbonaro/

Title: Racialinequality in high-school math course enrollments: the long-term effects ofearly inequalities

Abstract TBA