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Enrolling at university and the social influence of peers

Nicolas Pistolesi

IZA Journal of Labor Economics2022https://doi.org/10.2478/izajole-2022-0001article
ABDC A
Weight
0.60

Abstract

This article studies peer effects on the decision to enroll at university. To determine the social influence of peers, we use a measure encompassing the two major dimensions of social influence in the classroom: the ability and capacity of peers to exchange information about study options. This paper uses French administrative data on the universe of first year applicants to a single university over seven consecutive cohorts. We exploit idiosyncratic variations in the proportion of peers advised to change their educational choice. We find that our variable of interest has a small but negative and significant effect on the individual decision to attend university and observe stronger peer effects among groups of students of similar gender or socio-economic background. We also find a weaker impact of the proportion of peers advised to change their educational choice on the individuals of higher level of academic ability.

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https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.2478/izajole-2022-0001

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@article{nicolas2022,
  title        = {{Enrolling at university and the social influence of peers}},
  author       = {Nicolas Pistolesi},
  journal      = {IZA Journal of Labor Economics},
  year         = {2022},
  doi          = {https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.2478/izajole-2022-0001},
}

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Evidence weight

0.60

Balanced mode · F 0.40 / M 0.15 / V 0.05 / R 0.40

F · citation impact0.63 × 0.4 = 0.25
M · momentum0.80 × 0.15 = 0.12
V · venue signal0.50 × 0.05 = 0.03
R · text relevance †0.50 × 0.4 = 0.20

† Text relevance is estimated at 0.50 on the detail page — for your query’s actual relevance score, open this paper from a search result.