British boys from wealthy families perform better on tests than poor boys, survey finds

A comparison of children in Hong Kong, mainland China and the UK indicated that the connection between executive functions and socio-economic status was far less direct for British girls.

The link was absent altogether among boys and girls from mainland China and Hong Kong, who despite being generally less affluent than their British peers consistently outperformed them in tests.

Executive functions are the mental skills, such as flexible-thinking and self-control, that help people to meet goals.

They are mediated by the brain’s prefrontal cortex, which develops into a person’s mid-20s.

The research suggests that cultural factors may shape the acquisition of executive functions, but it is not clear what these factors are.

Possibilities include differences in curriculum, parenting or attitudes to education.

The comparison was conducted by a team of academics from the Faculty of Education and the Centre for Family Research at Cambridge University.

Dr Michelle Ellefson, reader in cognitive science, said: “Based on other research, we might have anticipated a direct link between socio-economic status and executive functions; in fact, this existed only for British boys.

“Pretty much any test pupils do at school requires executive functions, so if we want to reduce the achievement gap between children from different backgrounds, it’s important that we understand the mechanisms behind that relationship.”

Claire Hughes, professor of developmental psychology in the Centre for Family Research, said: “There is concern in the UK that among children from less-advantaged backgrounds, boys in particular often under-perform academically, and the possibility has been raised in some research that features of their home environment play a role in this.

“What is interesting here is that we saw no relationship between socio-economic status and executive functions for boys in Hong Kong and China. We need to investigate why that might be the case.”

The research was part of the Family Thinking Skills project, published in the Journal of Experimental Child Psychology.