| 1. |
- Green, Jenny, 1980-
(författare)
-
Elevers användande av formativ återkoppling i matematik
- 2014
-
Licentiatavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Students are often not satisfied with the feedback they receive, and do not always use it. Providing feedback on student learning has been shown to have a positive effect on learning, and is a key strategy in formative assessment. Students need to know (1) the goal, (2) their current level, and (3) the gap between these two, in order to advance towards the goal. In addition to receiving information about (1)-(3) above, students also need to actively engage with the feedback. In order to facilitate students’ use of the feedback given, a sample of upper-secondary mathematics students in this study received formative feedback (i.e. non-evaluative, supportive, timely and specific). The purpose of this research was to examine how students experienced this formative feedback, how they used it, and how experience, usage and goal orientation interacted.Data collection was done in the following steps. First, an intervention test with two calculation problems was given to the students. The answers were then handed in and processed based on theories of formative assessment and feedback. The students were given the formative feedback and, in order to capture their first impressions, they were asked how they perceived it. The next step was the regular teacher’s test – to give the students an opportunity to use the feedback. Finally, in-depth interviews were conducted in order to study students’ experiences of the formative feedback.An attempt was made to find factors explaining why the students use, or don’t use, their feedback. The students experienced the feedback in different ways, most notably finding the feedback useful, confusing or frightening. Some of these experiences indicate a view that assessment focuses on whether or not a mathematics question is answered correctly. Consequently, they view feedback as an extracurricular activity rather than as a learning situation. Some students seem to be able to overcome the contextual barriers and some do not even experience any barriers at all. The results suggest that it is essential to integrate feedback in the day-to-day instruction in order to increase the likelihood that all the students will derive benefit from it.
|
|
| 2. |
- Lindahl, Lena, 1973-
(författare)
-
Family Background and Individual Achievement : Essays in Empirical Labour Economics
- 2008
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- College choice and subsequent earnings. Results using Swedish sibling data. This paper investigates the relationship between college choice and annual earnings, using within-family variation in college choice. The results show that earnings vary significantly between students who graduated from different types of colleges and the earnings premium is larger for those who graduated at an old university. Do birth order and family size matter for intergenerational income mobility? Evidence from Sweden. Previous studies of intergenerational income mobility have not considered potential birth- order or family-size effects in the estimated income elasticity. This paper estimates the intergenerational income elasticity by birth-order position and family size. The main finding of this paper is that the elasticity tends to decrease with birth order for a given family size, especially for fathers and sons. A comparison of family and neighborhood effects on grades, test scores, educational attainment and income. Evidence from Sweden. This paper compares sibling and neighborhood correlations in school performance, educational attainment and income as a way to learn whether the neighborhood where a child grows up in might explain parts of the sibling similarities found in previous sibling correlation studies. The results show that living in the same neighborhood does not seem to add much to the sibling similarity. What More Than Parental Income? An exploration of what Swedish siblings get from their parents. In this paper, we explore what factors other that parental income can explain why siblings tend to have such similar outcomes as previous correlation studies show. Our results show that parental involvement and attitudes, especially propensity to plan ahead and willingness to postpone benefits to the future, are particularly important for the sibling similarity.
|
|
| 3. |
- Norlén, Olov
(författare)
-
Small Intestinal Neuroendocrine Tumor : A Rare Malignancy with Favorable Outcome
- 2013
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Small intestinal neuroendocrine tumor (SI-NET) is the most common small bowel tumor in Europe and USA, with an annual incidence of around 0.3-1.3/100000 persons. SI-NETs are the most common type of gastroenteropancreatic NETs (GEP-NETs), and they are known for their ability to produce hormones such as tachykinins and serotonin, as well as for their favorable long-term prognosis in comparison to gastrointestinal adenocarcinoma. The overall aim of the thesis was to investigate unknown or unclear aspects of SI-NET disease, in connection with prognosis, treatment and follow-up. Paper I confirmed several known negative prognostic factors and also showed, for the first time, that para-aortal lymph node metastases and peritoneal carcinomatosis were associated with worse survival by multivariable analyses. Locoregional surgery was associated with a low post-operative mortality, and a prolonged long-term survival by multivariable analysis. In Paper II we continued to investigate peritoneal carcinomatosis and found it be a risk factor not only for death, but also for emergency re-surgery. Furthermore, genetic analyses of samples from primary tumors in patients with and without peritoneal carcinomatosis showed a difference in the DNA between these two groups. In Paper III the outcome after liver surgery and/or radiofrequency ablation of liver metastases was investigated. To summarize, no difference in survival was seen in patients treated with surgery/radiofrequency ablation in comparison with matched controls. However, a superior radiological response of liver metasases and lower U-5-HIAA values were seen in patients subjected to liver surgery and/or radiofrequency ablation compared to matched controls. Paper IV compared ultrasonography, computed tomography and 11C-5HTP-PET in the follow-up after radiofrequency ablation of NET liver metastases. The study concluded that 11C-5HTP-PET depicted all residual tumors after RFA and that it, if used, should be combined with computed tomography for easier interpretation, as RFA areas are not clearly distinguishable with 11C-5HTP-PET alone. Paper V studied gallstone complications after somatostatin analog treatment in SI-NET patients, and concluded that there was a rather high risk to be subjected to a cholecystectomy due to biliary colic, cholecystitis, cholangitis or pancreatitis after primary surgery in somatostatin analog treated patients.
|
|
| 4. |
- Nybom, Martin, 1981-
(författare)
-
Essays on Educational Choice and Intergenerational Mobility
- 2012
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This thesis consists of four self-contained essays. The first essay concerns educational choice and the returns to college in Sweden. I apply a recently introduced econometric framework that allows for self selection and treatment effect heterogeneity. I also examine the influence of cognitive and noncognitive ability on college choice and the returns to college.Essays two through four concern different aspects of intergenerational income mobility. In the second essay, we study the impact on mobility estimates from heterogeneous income profiles and, more specifically, life-cycle bias. We use nearly career-long income measures for both fathers and sons to give a detailed account of this bias and assess recent methods to deal with it.In the third essay, we present a simple model of intergenerational transmission and use it to analyze the dynamic behavior of the intergenerational income elasticity following structural changes. We find that past structural frameworks, for example in the form of past policies or institutions, matter for current trends in mobility.The fourth essay provides a cross-country perspective on intergenerational income mobility. We construct comparable data sets for Sweden and the UK and account for country differences in the role of parental income for various productivity traits of children. Finally, we examine whether such differences can explain the country difference in intergenerational income mobility.
|
|
| 5. |
- Persson, Anna
(författare)
-
Activation Programs, Benefit Take-Up, and Labor Market Attachment
- 2013
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Essay 1 (with Ulrika Vikman): Previous literature shows that activation requirements for welfare participants reduce welfare participation, but the dynamics behind these results have not been fully examined. In this paper we use a rich set of register data covering the entire working age population in a Swedish municipality to study how the introduction of mandatory activation programs aimed at unemployed welfare participants affect the probability of entering and exiting welfare. Our results indicate that the reduction in the number of welfare participants is mainly due to an increase in welfare exits. The effect is larger for unmarried individuals without children and for young individuals. Among the young we also find a reduction in welfare entries. It thus seems that individuals with fewer family responsibilities are more responsive to the reform.Essay 2: We study the impact of a set of labour market programs directed to unemployed welfare participants on criminal behaviour. To isolate the causal effect we exploit the sequential implementation of activation programs in municipalities and districts in Stockholm county. We find that criminal activity increased as a result of the programs. The size and significance levels of the estimates should be interpreted with caution, but we can conclude that the reform did at least not have a mitigating effect on crime. We find no evidence that the effect is larger for financially motivated crime.Essay 3: Given the trend towards more active policies on reducing the take-up of welfare benefits, the consequences of leaving welfare constitutes an important issue. This paper studies disposable income and poverty among welfare leavers in Sweden during 19 years (1990-2008). Using a rich set of register data we can accurately measure disposable income and labor market outcomes. We find that there are large significant differences in post welfare financial situation among those working full time and those who work only a little or not at all. Leavers neither working nor receiving benefits from social insurance are likely to be financially dependent on family members, and are more likely than others to be in poverty. We conclude that leaving welfare is not always associated with becoming financially better off, post welfare well being depend heavily on labor market outcomes.Essay 4 (with Matz Dahlberg and Linna Martén): In 1999, the Swedish government announced one of the largest reforms of the national defense in modern times, which led to closures and significant downsizing of several military bases, as well as large reductions of the workforce. Previous studies have found that workers that have been displaced from their previous employers experience significant earnings declines, even in the long run. In this paper we study the labor market effects of the involuntary job losses following the drastic changes of the Swedish security policy. Using population wide register data we estimate how labor income and unemployment benefit take-up changed among those employed at the affected military bases, relative to workers at unaffected military units. We find a decrease in labor earnings, primarily among civil servants. We find no effect on neither unemployment nor employment, indicating that the drop in earnings is likely to be driven by lower re-employment wages.
|
|
| 6. |
- Richter, André, 1982-
(författare)
-
Essays on the Intergenerational Transmission of Disadvantage : The Role of Prenatal Health and Fertility
- 2016
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This thesis consists of four chapters on the role of prenatal health and fertility on the intergenerational transmission of disadvantage. The first two are related, and the third and fourth chapters are independent essays. The abstracts are provided in the following:Multigenerational effects of the 1918-19 influenza pandemic on educational attainment: Evidence from SwedenWe use the 1918-19 influenza pandemic in Sweden as a natural experiment to estimate the effects of a prenatal health shock on the children of those who experienced the pandemic as a prenatal insult. We find that for women educational attainment decreases by 3-4 months of schooling if their mothers potentially experienced the Spanish flu as a prenatal insult. For men, educational attainment decreases by 4-7 months of schooling if their fathers were potentially prenatally exposed. We find no mother-son or father-daughter transmission.Second generation effects of prenatal health shocks: Disentangling social from biological pathwaysSecond-generation effects of prenatal health shocks can represent direct biological effects and indirect effects via the parental household environment, but the relative importance of these two effects remains unknown. We combine an exogenous source of variation in fetal health with an adoption design and exploit the fact that adoptees do not inherit health conditions from their adoptive parents, which rules out direct effects. Adoptees are furthermore not exposed to the home environment of their biological parents, which rules out indirect post-birth effects. Our results are imprecisely estimated and need to be interpreted as suggestive at best, but seem to suggest that direct second generation effects may be positive, whereas indirect effects may be negative.Intergenerational income mobility and fertility patterns in Sweden & USAI contrast the USA and Sweden to shed light on the question if differences in fertility patterns can explain differences in intergenerational income mobility. I document substantial fertility differences between both countries and I quantify the importance of these differences using a simple decomposition of persistence metrics. I find that intergenerational persistence increases (decreases) in the number of children in Sweden (USA). A substantial part of the difference in intergenerational mobility estimates between Sweden and the USA originates from differences in the family size distribution.Low birth weight and parental investments in an intervention contextUsing data from a reading intervention targeted at disadvantaged households in Chicago, we investigate whether children’s initial health endowment affects parental behavior and their responsiveness to behavioral tools aimed at increasing parental investments. We find that parents with low birth weight children increase parental reading time twice as much than their normal birth weight counterparts after receiving a simple nudge to do so. These parents do not differ in their pre-intervention time investments, although there is some albeit weak evidence that their subjective beliefs about the returns to their time investments could be lower. There is no strong evidence for higher subjective costs of reading. Goal setting behavior is markedly different, though. While both groups of parents typically do not reach their reading goals, parents of normal birth weight children adjust their goals downwards in reaction to past failure of goal attainment.
|
|
| 7. |
- Böhlmark, Anders, 1973-
(författare)
-
School Reform, Educational Achievement and Lifetime Income : Essays in Empirical Labor Economics
- 2007
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The Impact of School Choice on Pupil Achievement, Segregation and Costs: Swedish Evidence. This paper evaluates school choice at the compulsory school level. We estimate the impact of an increased enrolment in private schools on average achievement using within-municipality variation over time. We find positive effects, shown to be the sum of a (small) private school attendance effect and a competition effect. We also find effects on segregation and costs.Age at Immigration and School Performance: A Siblings Analysis Using Swedish Register Data. This paper analyzes the role of age at immigration for the school performance gap between native and immigrant pupils by exploiting within-family variation. The critical age is about nine, above which there is a strong negative impact on performance. The results are similar for boys and girls, but vary by region of origin. A comparison of sibling-difference and cross-sectional estimates reveals striking similarities. Integration of Childhood Immigrants in the Short and in the Long Run: Swedish Evidence. I study childhood immigrants at different stages in life in order to examine the role of age at immigration for educational and labor market outcomes. I find that childhood immigrants tend later to recover strongly in terms of educational achievement. Yet, the same individuals are on average found to be poorly integrated into the labor market. Life-Cycle Variations in the Association between Current and Lifetime Income: Replication and Extension for Sweden. We apply a generalized errors-in-variables model, recently developed by Steven Haider and Gary Solon, in order to produce estimates of the association between current and lifetime income. We find strong life-cycle patterns. This implies that the widespread use of current income as a proxy for lifetime income leads to inconsistent estimates even when the proxy is used as the dependent variable. We find country similarities, but gender and cohort differences.
|
|
| 8. |
- Hirvonen, Lalaina, 1974-
(författare)
-
Essays in Empirical Labour Economics : Family Background, Gender and Earnings
- 2010
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- All three essays in this thesis are concerned with the interrelation of family, gender and labour market outcomes. The first paper investigates family earnings mobility between parents and sons, and parents and daughters, highlighting the role of assortative mating. The results suggest that daughters are more mobile than sons. I also find that Sweden has a higher degree of mobility compared to the U.S., and that assortative mating is an important underlying channel for earnings transmission. The difference in mobility between the two countries does not inherently depend on factors affecting the marriage match. Moreover, adult economic outcomes are more dependent on family background for those at the lower end of the earnings distribution. The second study analyses the long-run effects of an increase in family size on the 1980-2005 labour market outcomes of Swedish men and women. The decision to have (more) children is dependent on current and future labour market prospects. I use the exogenous variations in the sex composition of the first two children to overcome this endogeneity problem. My findings suggest that having an additional child has a stronger negative impact on earnings than on participation. However, mothers experience a substantial but not complete long-term recovery in earnings. The third paper illustrates the difficulty in disentangling the underlying channels of intergenerational earnings persistence using a path analysis model. On closer examination, such a model has a potential shortcoming since the covariates are correlated to other unobserved factors. The results suggest that education is the most influential mechanism in the earnings transmission process, while IQ, mental ability and BMI are of secondary importance. However, education is sensitive to the inclusion of other covariates and the order in which these are entered into the equation.
|
|
| 9. |
- Holmlund, Helena, 1976-
(författare)
-
Education and the Family : Essays in Empirical Labour Economics
- 2006
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Estimating Long-Term Consequences of Teenage Childbearing: An Examination of the Siblings Approach In the study of the consequences of teenage motherhood, the siblings approach has been proposed as a strategy to control for unobserved family background. Revisiting this literature, my contribution in adopting the siblings approach lies in controlling for heterogeneity within the family by using pre-motherhood school performance, a characteristic that differs across sisters. My findings confirm the presumption that within-family heterogeneity can result in biased sibling estimates. Estimating Intergenerational Schooling Effects: A Comparison of Methods Recent studies that aim to estimate the causal link between the education of parents and their children provide evidence that is far from conclusive. This paper explores why. There are a number of possible explanations. One is that these studies rely on different data sources, gathered in different countries at different times. Another one is that these studies use different identification strategies. Three identification strategies are currently in use: identical twins; adoptees; and instrumental variables. In this paper we apply each of these three strategies to one particular Swedish data set, with the purpose to explain the disparate evidence in the recent literature. Our findings indicate that the estimated impact of parental education on that of their child in Sweden does depend on identification, which suggests that country and cohort differences do not lie behind the observed disparities. Intergenerational Mobility and Assortative Mating: Effects of An Educational Reform This paper provides new evidence on the role of the educational system for intergenerational mobility. I evaluate an educational reform, implemented in Sweden in the 1950s, which postponed ability tracking and extended compulsory education from seven to nine years. The reform may have influenced intergenerational mobility by several different mechanisms, both directly and indirectly through changing the degree of assortative mating. My results indicate that the reform indeed resulted in a sizeable increase in intergenerational income mobility, and in a lower educational association between children and parents. The reform also contributed to reducing the association in education between an individual’s partner and parents, which I interpret as an effect operating through reform effects on mating patterns. Is the Gender Gap in School Performance Affected by the Sex of the Teacher? Girls outperform boys in school. We investigate whether the gender performance gap can be attributed to the fact that the teacher profession is female dominated, that is, is there a causal effect on student outcomes from having a same-sex teacher? Exploring the fact that teacher turnover and student mobility give rise to variation in teacher’s gender within student and subject, we estimate the effect on student outcomes of changing to a teacher of the same sex. We find no strong support for our initial hypothesis that a same-sex teacher improves student outcomes.
|
|
| 10. |
- Sund, Krister, 1969-
(författare)
-
Teachers, Family and Friends : Essays in Economics of Education
- 2007
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Family background and school performance during a turbulent era of school reforms In the 1990s, Swedish education policy took several steps towards more decentralization and more room for parental school choice. We study the relationship between school performance and family background during this period of time. We use two measures of family background; sibling correlations in grade point average (GPA) and correlations between the child’s GPA and parental income. We find that both relationships were remarkably stable over this turbulent period of time. Is the Gender Gap in School Performance Affected by the Sex of the Teacher? We investigate whether the gender performance gap can be attributed to the fact that the teacher profession is female dominated, that is, is there a causal effect on student outcome from having a same-sex teacher? We find no strong support for our initial hypothesis that a same-sex teacher improves student outcome. Detracking Swedish compulsory schools – any losers, any winners? In this paper I exploit the fact that different tracking policies were practiced simultaneously in Swedish compulsory schools, but also that tracking policies changed over time within schools. The results show that there are no average effects of tracking but differential effects. Students with a low-educated family background are more likely to fail math at high school if they have attended a school that practiced tracking than their non-tracked peers. Estimating Peer Effects in Swedish High School using School, Teacher, and Student Fixed Effects. In this paper I use a rich dataset in order to observe each student over time in different subjects and courses. I find positive peer effects for the average student, but also non-linear effects. Lower achievers benefit more from an increase in both mean and the spread in peer achievement within the classroom than their higher-achieving peers.
|
|
