The contribution of intersectionality to quantitative research into educational inequalities

Abstract

Educational inequalities are one of the most critical issues facing contemporary societies. While there is a substantial body of quantitative literature tracking inequalities in education based on students' characteristics, an emerging literature is applying the concept of intersectionality to acknowledge the multiple, overlapping impact of these characteristics. We discuss the contributions of intersectionality to quantitative research on (vertical and horizontal) educational inequalities (attainment and subject choice). We then discuss the limitations inherent in this work, along with methodological innovations aimed at addressing these limitations. Finally, we make recommendations for researchers, to encourage greater use of intersectionality in quantitative educational research and thereby to deepen our knowledge of inequalities.

Recognitive Justice and Educational Inequalities: An Intersectional Approach Involving Secondary Grade School Students in Greece

“…Researchers studying the quality of pedagogical relationships in school and the groups of students who are most affected by them, either positively or negatively, usually consider the categories of ethnicity, the socio-economic or educational level of the students' families, and gender. In quantitative research, these categories are usually examined separately from each other [47,48]. This approach, however, presents significant limitations in understanding such a complex phenomenon as educational inequality.…”

“…Therefore, the intersectional approach offers opportunities to analyze qualitative differences and similarities within groups and multiple, cross-sectional inequalities between those groups [54]. The interdisciplinarity lens is particularly useful in the case of immigrant students because it prevents monothematic analysis based on ethnicity [55] and focuses on the dynamics developed by the interaction of students' different social situations, such as gender, socioeconomic status, ethnicity, and immigration background [48,50].…”

Mapping inequalities in school attendance: The relationship between dimensions of socioeconomic status and forms of school absence

“…Fourth, intersectional perspectives (e.g., Codiroli Mcmaster and Cook 2018) suggest that socioeconomic circumstances influence adolescents' life courses in conjunction with other individual and family characteristics. The strength of the relationship between socioeconomic background and school absenteeism may vary depending upon pupils' sex (e.g., Attwood and Croll 2006;Hemphill et al 2010) or place of residence (Achilles et al 2007).…”

An Intersectional Investigation of Study Abroad Intent among Latino/a and White First-generation College Students

“…Next, using only significant predictors, we conducted four separate, logistic regression analyses to identify predictors of study abroad intent for each (generational status by ethnicity) subgroup. Given the relatively small subsamples in our study and the number of possible interaction terms, we expected that the results of subgroup analyses would be more statistically sound and interpretable than were we to use a multiplicative approach examining interactions between significant predictors, generational status, and ethnicity (Christoffersen, 2017;Mcmaster & Cook, 2018).…”