PISA index of economic, social and cultural status (ESCS)

The PISA ESCS is a composite score built by the indicators parental education (PARED), highest parental occupation (HISEI), and home possessions (HOMEPOS) including books in the home via principal component analysis (PCA). (See description of these three variables above). The rationale for using these three components was that socio-economic status has usually been seen as based on education, occupational status and income. As no direct income measure has been available from the PISA data, the existence of household items has been used as a proxy for family wealth.

Constructs Being Measured

Primary
Physical well-being
Secondary
Economic well-being

How to Access and Cite

Outcome Families

Well-being

 

Programmatic Purpose-terms

Program-level monitoring and evaluation

Instrument Characteristics

Type of items

Scale index based on student questionnaire

Original target population

15 year olds

Format
Questionnaire

Applicable Grade Levels-terms

Secondary

Supporting Research

Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD)
Bradshaw, Hoelscher & Richardson, 2007
Hauser, 1994; McMillan, et al., 1995
Ganzeboom & Treiman, 2003

Available Languages

Rationale

This resource provides guidance on what components are taken into account when developing an index of economic, social and cultural status, which can be used as a standized metric for physical and economic well-being.

Points to Consider

For more guidance on measuring student learning and best practices in adapting measurement tools to your contexts, check out the Portal page on Monitoring and Evaluation. You can also contact Alvin Vista (Knowledge Lead, Student Outcomes) and Robbie Dean (Director of Research) for specific questions.