A very pertinent question in the context of increasing disposable income of parents but reducing ‘quality time’ within families, there is no definite positive correlation between children’s grades and their parents’ investment in them. An interesting article titled “Financial help from parents leads to fall in students’ grades”, by Tamar Lewin, January 16, 2013, in the daily newspaper Hindustan Times had the following to say on the question—
“a new national study (in the USA) has found that more the college money parents provide — whether in absolute terms or as a share of total costs — the lower their children’s college grades. Students from wealthy families are more likely than those from poor families to go to college, and those whose parents pay their way are more likely to graduate. However, their grades may not be very satisfactory.”
According to ‘More Is More or More Is Less? Parents Financial Investments During College’, (a study by Laura Hamilton, a sociology professor at the University of California), greater parental contributions were linked with lower grades across all kinds of four-year institutions. ‘It is a modest effect, not big enough to make the kid flunk out of college,’ said Hamilton.
‘But it was surprising because everybody has always assumed that the more you give, the better your child does.’
The negative impact on grades was less at elite institutions than at other private, expensive, out-of-state colleges. The higher graduation rate of students whose parents paid their way is not surprising, she says, since many students leave college for financial reasons.
‘Oddly, a lot of the parents who contributed the most money did not get the best returns on their investment,” she said. “Their students were more likely to stay and graduate, but their GPAs were mediocre at best, and some I did not see studying even once. I wondered if that was nationally true, which led me to this quantitative study, which found that it is.’
Hamilton found that students with the lowest grades were those whose parents paid for them without discussing the students’ responsibility for their education. Parents could minimise the negative effects, she says, by setting clear expectations about grades and the progress towards graduation.
Unfortunately, in India there is no research study of a similar kind. It is not far-fetched to imagine the research findings quoted above to be not out of context in India.
Source:
The article referred to is available at http://www.hindustantimes.com/news-feed/chunk-ht-ui-print-delhi-mainnews-world/financial-help-from-parents-leads-to-fall-in-students-grades/article1-990786.aspx
