Every year, the Leibniz Institute for Educational Trajectories (LIfBi) honors outstanding scientific work based on data from the National Education Panel Study (NEPS) with a publication award. This year, due to the large number of high-quality submissions, the award was given to two groups of authors. First, Sascha dos Santos, Prof. Dr. Martina Dieckhoff, Prof. Dr. Martin Ehlert, and Prof. Dr. Antje Mertens received the award for their comparative study on the advantages of work-related continuing education measures in Germany and the United Kingdom. The other award went to Mieke Johannsen, Prof. Dr. Naemi Dorothee Brandt, Prof. Dr. Olaf Köller, and Prof. Dr. Jenny Wagner. Their publication highlights the role of academic self-concept and personality in school performance during adolescence.
In their publication “Does training beget training over the life course? Cumulative advantage in work-related non-formal training participation in Germany and the UK,” Sascha dos Santos, Prof. Dr. Martina Dieckhoff, Prof. Dr. Martin Ehlert, and Prof. Dr. Antje Mertens compare the dynamics and inequality in participation in work-related, non-formal continuing education in Germany and the UK. Using long-term data collected from the initial cohort 6 “adults” of the German National Education Panel and the British “Understanding Society” study, the researchers analyze whether continuing education in working life is influenced more by cumulative advantages in line with the principle of “continuing education promotes (further) continuing education” or by stable initial characteristics such as formal education.
Dos Santos and his colleagues conclude that continuing education experiences in both countries are mainly determined by formal initial education and training as well as work and company characteristics, but that the cumulative advantage plays a remarkable, independent role—even more so in the UK than in Germany. However, the cumulative advantage reinforces inequalities over time.
An interdisciplinary jury composed of members of the LIfBi management praised the work for its precise and differentiated examination of the various effects of initial education and continuing education, which is only possible on the basis of longitudinal data as provided by the NEPS and corresponding statistical methods.
For Sascha dos Santos, the NEPS Publication Award is a special recognition of the joint research work carried out by the team. At the same time, he sees it as a signal that, in times of technological change, education and labor market research must not stop at initial education, but take into account continuing education processes throughout the entire occupational career in order to adequately understand social inequalities.
In view of the large number of high-quality nominations, this year the jury decided to honor a second publication based on NEPS data with the award. This was the publication “Who flourishes in school? The interplay of academic self-concept and personality and its role for academic performance in middle adolescence” by Mieke Johannsen, Prof. Dr. Naemi Dorothee Brandt, Prof. Dr. Olaf Köller, and Prof. Dr. Jenny Wagner.
Mieke Johannsen and her co-authors investigate why some students are more successful than others. For this purpose, they combined motivational and personality predictors and examined their relevance for academic performance using ninth-grade students from two independent samples. The results show the complex interaction between motivation, personality, and sociodemographic variables in predicting academic performance and underscore the need to take this interactive nature into account. In its statement, the jury particularly emphasized the extensive analyses using latent moderated regression models to examine the relationship between socio-emotional characteristics and academic performance levels and changes therein, which are possible thanks to the longitudinal design and cross-cohort methodology of the NEPS and thus significantly complement previous cross-sectional findings.
“On behalf of my co-authors, I would like to express my sincere thanks to LIfBi for this award. The NEPS Publication Award is a great recognition of our work and of the integrative research perspective we have chosen,” said Mieke Johannsen. “The NEPS data allow us to combine different perspectives on school learning environments, thereby contributing to a better understanding of differential educational trajectories."
The award ceremony took place during the 10th International NEPS Conference at LIfBi in Bamberg. The award winners each gave a keynote speech, which was also open to the public as part of the LIfBi Lectures series.
Bibliographic information
dos Santos, S., Dieckhoff, M., Ehlert, M., & Mertens, A. (2024). Does training beget training over the life course? Cumulative advantage in work-related non-formal training participation in Germany and the UK. European Sociological Review, 40(3), 464–478. https://doi.org/10.1093/esr/jcae022
Johannsen, M., Brandt, N. D., Köller, O., & Wagner, J. (2024). Who flourishes in school? The interplay of academic self-concept and personality and its role for academic performance in middle adolescence. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 127(6), 1237-1262. https://doi.org/10.1037/pspp0000525