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Deliverable 2 - SES and Education Time

Project: John Fell Fund, Oxford University

Together with Jooyeoun Suh, we investigate how SES affects studying time among school children.

Using the 2019 Korean Time Use Survey, we explore how family SES relates to educational achievement (measured in educational time) among school children by gender and weekday. The results show that there are gender differences in how SES affects academic achievement, particularly when analyzed by age. Overall, the findings show that boys spend significantly more time on study both on weekdays and weekends. These differences mostly come from out-of-school educational activities, such as private tutoring and self-study time. The family SES advantages in in-school and out-of-school study time are observed among boys in the high-/mid-income category until college/university age. The SES differences can only be confirmed among the highest family SES girls. The findings indicate that the higher family income children of both genders spend considerably more time on out-of-school study both on weekdays and weekends than their low-income counterparts. The result highlights the inequalities in access to out-of-school educational opportunities for the lowest household income families in South Korea. 

This project will be presented at the USU Conference on Korean children & youth in Utah, USA. Date: June 3, 2022.

Working paper is forthcoming.