Impacts of playing after school on academic performance: a propensity score matching approach

ABSTRACT

We present a plausible causal analysis of the impact of playing after school on academic performance and investigate parental support as a potential channel. We exploit the data from the 2011 Trends in International Mathematics and Science Survey to evaluate the effects by using a propensity score matching approach. The results show that playing after school increases math and science scores of fourth grade students. We find that White students benefit from playing after school, but non-White students do not. Furthermore, we present evidence that parental support enhances the effects of playing after school.

KEYWORDS:

• Academic performance
• parental support
• play after school
• propensity score matching

JEL CLASSIFICATIONS:

• I12
• I14
• I21

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to Yu Zhang, Samuel D. Towne Jr and Jaehyun Ahn for their help and valuable comments.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Marco A. Palma http://orcid.org/0000-0002-2080-3308

Zhicheng Phil Xu http://orcid.org/0000-0003-2198-8612

Notes

1. Other literature shows that health relevant issues are related with children aged 6–11 (see Ogden et al. 2002; Yawn et al. 2015).

2. There is evidence indicating that Girl’s Club/Girl’s Scout or Boy’s Club involve certain levels of physical activities in academic studies, according to scientific reports and press releases from health science organizations (Lipscomb 2007; Ornelas and Rosenkranz 2009; Rosenkranz, Behrens, and Dzewaltowski 2010; ACSM 2016; Girl Scouts of the USA 2016; GSOFCT 2016; Kansas State University 2009; BGCA 2016).

3. The radius is set to 0.05 in this study.

4. TIMSS 2011 is the latest survey available.