The effect of overcrowded housing on educational attainment: evidence from British Household Panel Survey Data

The effect of living in a crowded household on a student’s educational attainment has been examined to a lesser extent in the broader economic literature exploring the relationship between housing and educational outcomes. This paper contributes to this niche field of the economic housing literature by conducting a systematic literature review and empirically investigating the impact of household crowdedness on educational attainment in the UK. The systematic literature review results show that little causal evidence exists and correlational studies often cannot provide consistent evidence of the effect of household crowdedness on different educational attainment measures. In the empirical part of the paper, using British Household Panel Survey data, pooled OLS models reveal a statistically significant negative association between household crowdedness and educational achievement. Controlling for individual fixed effects, the negative effect of household crowdedness is statistically significant only for UK men. Within the context of achieving the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030, particularly SDG 4, these findings encourage the combination of education and housing policies in the pursuit of equal learning opportunities and improving student’s educational outcomes.

Keywords: Educational attainment, household overcrowdedness, British Household Panel Survey, systematic literature review