Growing up poor but doing well: Contextual factors that predict academic success.

This paper combines data on family, school, neighborhood, and city contexts with survey data from the Year 9 (n = 2,193) and Year 15 (n = 2, 236) Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study to study children in America's inner-cities who are "beating the odds". We identify children as beating the odds if they were born to families of low socio-economic status but scored above the state average in reading, vocabulary and math at age 9, and were academically on-track by age 15. We also examine if the influences of these contexts are developmentally nuanced. We find that living in two parent households where harsh parenting methods are absent (family context) and living in neighborhoods where two parent families predominate (neighborhood context) are protective factors that help children beat the odds. We also find that city-wide contexts of higher levels of religiosity and fewer single parent households contribute to children beating the odds, however, these macro predictors are weaker when compared with family/neighborhood contexts. We find that these contextual effects are indeed developmentally nuanced. We conclude with a discussion of some interventions and policies that could help increase the number of at-risk children who beat the odds.

Government Assistance Protects Low-Income Families from Eviction.

A lack of affordable housing is a pressing issue for many low-income American families and can lead to eviction from their homes. Housing assistance programs to address this problem include public housing and other assistance, including vouchers, through which a government agency offsets the cost of private market housing. This paper assesses whether the receipt of either category of assistance reduces the probability that a family will be evicted from their home in the subsequent six years. Because no randomized trial has assessed these effects, we use observational data and formalize the conditions under which a causal interpretation is warranted. Families living in public housing experience less eviction conditional on pre-treatment variables. We argue that this evidence points toward a causal conclusion that assistance, particularly public housing, protects families from eviction.

Geography of intergenerational mobility and child development.

Recent research by Chetty and colleagues finds that children's chances of upward mobility are affected by the communities in which they grow up [Chetty R, Hendren N (2016) Working paper 23002]. However, the developmental pathways through which communities of origin translate into future economic gain are not well understood. In this paper we examine the association between Chetty and Hendren's county-level measure of intergenerational mobility and children's cognitive and behavioral development. Focusing on children from low-income families, we find that growing up in a county with high upward mobility is associated with fewer externalizing behavioral problems by age 3 years and with substantial gains in cognitive test scores between ages 3 and 9 years. Growing up in a county with 1 SD better intergenerational mobility accounts for ∼20% of the gap in developmental outcomes between children from low- and high-income families. Collectively, our findings suggest that the developmental processes through which residential contexts promote upward mobility begin early in childhood and involve the enrichment of both cognitive and social-emotional development.

A Research Note on the Prevalence of Housing Eviction Among Children Born in U.S. Cities.

A growing body of research suggests that housing eviction is more common than previously recognized and may play an important role in the reproduction of poverty. The proportion of children affected by housing eviction, however, remains largely unknown. We estimate that one in seven children born in large U.S. cities in 1998-2000 experienced at least one eviction for nonpayment of rent or mortgage between birth and age 15. Rates of eviction were substantial across all cities and demographic groups studied, but children from disadvantaged backgrounds were most likely to experience eviction. Among those born into deep poverty, we estimate that approximately one in four were evicted by age 15. Given prior evidence that forced moves have negative consequences for children, we conclude that the high prevalence and social stratification of housing eviction are sufficient to play an important role in the reproduction of poverty and warrant greater policy attention.

Links Between Childhood Exposure to Violent Contexts and Risky Adolescent Health Behaviors.

PURPOSE: To assess whether childhood exposure to violent contexts is prospectively associated with risky adolescent health behavior and whether these associations are specific to different contexts of violence and different types of risky behavior. METHODS: Data come from 2,684 adolescents in the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study, a population-based birth cohort study of children born between 1998 and 2000 in 20 large American cities. Using logistic regression models, we evaluate whether exposure to 6 indicators of community violence and 7 indicators of family violence at ages 5 and 9 is associated with risky sexual behavior, substance use, and obesity risk behavior at age 15. RESULTS: Controlling for a range of adolescent, parent, and neighborhood covariates, each additional point on the community violence scale is associated with 8% higher odds of risky sexual behavior but not substance use or obesity risk behavior. Alternatively, each additional point on the family violence scale is associated with 20% higher odds of substance use but not risky sexual behavior or obesity risk behavior. CONCLUSIONS: Childhood exposure to violent contexts is associated with risky adolescent health behaviors, but the associations are context and behavior specific. After including covariates, we find no association between childhood exposure to violent contexts and obesity risk behavior.

Neighborhood Disadvantage and Telomere Length: Results from the Fragile Families Study.

Telomeres are repetitive nucleotide sequences located at the ends of chromosomes that protect genetic material. We use data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study to analyze the relationship between exposure to spatially concentrated disadvantage and telomere length for white and black mothers. We find that neighborhood disadvantage is associated with shorter telomere length for mothers of both races. This finding highlights a potential mechanism through which the unique spatially concentrated disadvantage faced by African Americans contributes to racial health disparities. We conclude that equalizing the health and socioeconomic status of black and white Americans will be very difficult without reducing levels of residential segregation in the United States.

Cohesive Neighborhoods Where Social Expectations Are Shared May Have Positive Impact On Adolescent Mental Health.

Adolescent mental health problems are associated with poor health and well-being in adulthood. We used data from a cohort of 2,264 children born in large US cities in 1998-2000 to examine whether neighborhood collective efficacy (a combination of social cohesion and control) is associated with improvements in adolescent mental health. We found that children who grew up in neighborhoods with high collective efficacy experienced fewer depressive and anxiety symptoms during adolescence than similar children from neighborhoods with low collective efficacy. The magnitude of this neighborhood effect is comparable to the protective effects of depression prevention programs aimed at general or at-risk adolescent populations. Our findings did not vary by family or neighborhood income, which indicates that neighborhood collective efficacy supports adolescent mental health across diverse populations and urban settings. We recommend a greater emphasis on neighborhood environments in individual mental health risk assessments and greater investment in community-based initiatives that strengthen neighborhood social cohesion and control.