title: Does Expert Advice Improve Educational Choice?
abstract: This paper reports evidence that an individual meeting with a study counselor at high school significantly improves the quality of choice of tertiary educational field, as self-assessed 18 months after graduation from college. To address endogeneity, we explore the variation in study counseling practices between schools as an instrumental variable (IV). Following careful scrutiny of the validity of the IV, our results indicate a significant and positive influence of study counseling on the quality of educational choice, foremost among males and those with low educated parents. The overall result is stable across a number of robustness checks.
authors.affiliation: Department of Economics and Research Centre for Education and the Labour Market (ROA), Maastricht University, Maastricht, the Netherlands.
authors.forename: Lex
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Borghans
authors.affiliation: Department of Economics and Research Centre for Education and the Labour Market (ROA), Maastricht University, Maastricht, the Netherlands.|Swedish Institute for Social Research (SOFI), Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden.
authors.forename: Bart H H
authors.initials: BH
authors.lastname: Golsteyn
authors.affiliation: Swedish Institute for Social Research (SOFI), Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden.
authors.forename: Anders
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Stenberg
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D002755:Choice Behavior; D003376:Counseling; D004522:Educational Status; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009426:Netherlands; D010290:Parents; D012574:Schools / Q000458:organization & administration; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D014495:Universities; D014830:Vocational Guidance