Volume 14, Number 1 (Winter) 1979
Link, Charles R., and Edward C. Ratledge. 1979. "Student Perceptions, IQ, and Achievement." Journal of Human Resources 14(1):98-111.
The study analyzes the determinants of reading achievement for 500 fourth-graders in the Wilmington, Delaware, school district. The data are an improvement over those used by past researchers because of the concurrent availability of student IQ, pretest and posttest reading scores, student perception and motivation information, and individual teacher characteristics matched with their individual students. The main results are (1) a large positive relation between achievement and the student's perception of a positive teacher attitude toward himself, and (2) a somewhat smaller, but nonetheless significant, positive effect of the student's perception of the parents' attitude toward the student's ability to succeed in life. The observed relationships suggest that earlier emphasis on more traditional teacher characteristics such as years of education and experience may have been misplaced.
The authors are, respectively, Associate Professor, Department of Economics, University of Delaware, and Associate Director, College of Urban Affairs, University of Delaware. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the 1975 American Statistical Association meeting. We would like to acknowledge the helpful comments of the referees and the editor.
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