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Australian Journal of Psychology 2016; 68: 6169

doi: 10.1111/ajpy.12083

Age 7 intelligence and paternal education appear best predictors

of educational attainment: The Port Pirie Cohort Study
Hannah A.D. Keage,1 Graciela Muniz,2 Lisa Kurylowicz,1 Miranda Van Hooff,3 Levina Clark,4 Amelia K. Searle,3
Michael G. Sawyer,5,6 Peter Baghurst,7 and Alexander McFarlane3
1

Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory, School of Psychology, Social Work and Social Policy, University of South
Australia, 3Centre for Traumatic Stress Studies, School of Population Health, Disciplines of 5Paediatrics and 7Public
Health, University of Adelaide, 4School of Psychology, Flinders University, 6Research and Evaluation Unit, Womens
and Childrens Health Network, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia, and 2MRC Unit for Lifelong Health and Ageing,
University College London, London, UK
Abstract
Objective: The number of years of education an individual completes is related to their future morbidity and mortality. There are
obvious drivers for educational attainment such as childhood intellect, parental intelligence and education attainment, as well
as socioeconomic status; and associations may be age-dependent. We investigated associations between intelligence across
childhood (collected at two, four, seven and between eleven and thirteen years) and educational attainment (total years) by the
late 20s in the Port Pirie Cohort Study, taking into account maternal intelligence, parental schooling and occupational prestige.
Method: There were 388 individuals from the population-based longitudinal Port Pirie Cohort Study (South Australia) who
provided educational attainment data in the 2008-9 data collection wave. A Structural Equation Model was employed to test
associations between educational attainment and childhood cognitive/IQ measures, taking into account parental factors of IQ,
schooling and socioeconomic status. Results: The vast majority of variables displayed significant simple correlations with each
other in expected directions, e.g. child cognitive/IQ measures with maternal IQ. In the full structural equation model, paternal
schooling and child intelligence at seven years were the only variables significantly related to educational attainment by the late
20s; maternal intelligence was strongly associated with early life but not adolescent intelligence. Conclusions: These findings
highlight the complex inter-generational transmission of social advantages, and substantiate the independent effects of education
and intelligence on later morbidly and mortality.
Key words: cognitive development, educational attainment, intelligence, longitudinal, parental

BACKGROUND
Educational attainment, that is, how many years of schooling and any tertiary studies an individual completes, is a
critical factor to understand within a public health context
as it associated with morbidity and mortality. For example,
those who complete more education in early life have
better physical health (Wrulich et al., 2013) including a
lower risk of cardiovascular disease and obesity in midlife
(Chandola, Deary, Blane, & Batty, 2006; Lawlor, Clark,
Davey Smith, & Leon, 2006; Lawlor, David, Clark,

Correspondence: Hannah Keage, PhD, Cognitive Neuroscience

Laboratory, School of Psychology, Social Work and Social Policy,
University of South Australia, GPO BOX 2741, Adelaide, SA 5000,
Australia. Email: hannah.keage@unisa.edu.au
Received 25 September 2014. Accepted for publication 17
November 2014.
2014 The Australian Psychological Society

McIntyre, & Leon, 2008; Paile-Hyvrinen et al., 2009;

Richards et al., 2009; Yu, Han, Cao, & Guo, 2010), rate
their midlife health as better (Hagger-Johnson, Batty,
Deary, & von Stumm, 2011; Wrulich et al., 2013), display
improved health behaviours in midlife (Gale, Johnson,
Deary, Schoon, & Batty, 2009), have higher cognitive performance (Clouston et al., 2012; Wilson et al., 2009) along
with a lower risk of dementia in late life (EClipSE, 2010),
and die later (Lager, Bremberg, & Vger, 2009), as compared with those with less education. These mortality and
morbidity associations with education attainment are well
established; however, the predictors of the accrual of educational attainment are not.
Childhood intelligence is an obvious driver for educational
attainment in adulthood (Batty, Kivimaki, & Deary, 2010;
Deary & Johnson, 2010; Lager, Modin, De Stavola, & Vger,
2012; McCall, 1977; Strenze, 2007). In a meta-analysis,
including nearly 85,000 individuals over 59 studies, intelligence correlated (sample size weighted average correlation)

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H.A.D. Keage et al.

with educational attainment at r = .56 (95% confidence

interval (CI) .53.58), with intelligence measured between 3
and 23 years, and educational attainment between 20 and
78 years (Strenze, 2007). When age at intelligence testing
was taken into account, it was found that the strength of the
relationship between intelligence and educational attainment increased as childhood age increasedthe sample size
weighted correlation was r = .42 for intelligence testing
taken 310 years, r = .57 for 1115 years, r = .58 for 1618
years, and r = .61 for 1923 years (Strenze, 2007)which
may be due to increasing influence of genes and/or life
experience. This analysis employed a cross-sectional
approach as data were collected from different individuals
across childhood, and there appears a lack of longitudinal
research where the contributions of multiple measures of
childhood intelligence to later educational attainment are
assessed within the same cohort. This is particularly important for teasing apart the contributions of childhood intelligence and educational attainment on midlife and late-life
factors such as health, as some variability in the intelligence
scores obtained once the child is at school is likely due to the
differential effects of education on cognitive development
(Wrulich et al., 2013). By measuring cognitive ability or
intelligence before entry into school, or early into schooling,
the effects of education on scores obtained are minimised.
Parental factors such as intelligence, their own educational attainment, as well as socioeconomic status influence
their childs intelligence (Der, Batty, & Deary, 2006;
Johnson, Gow, Corley, Starr, & Deary, 2010; Lager et al.,
2012; Sanson, Smart, & Misson, 2011). For example,
maternal intelligence has been found to be strongly related
to the cognitive development of the child (Der et al.,
2006); and paternal socioeconomic status has been positively related, and paternal educational attainment negatively related, to childhood intelligence at 11 years of age
(Johnson et al., 2010). Lager et al. (2012), however, found
a positive relationship between paternal schooling and
intelligence of their children (measured at 10 and 20 years)
and educational attainment at age 20. The differential
importance of these various parental factors to the relationship between their childs intelligence and education is
therefore unclear.
It was our aim to understand the predictors of education
attainment by investigating relationships between childhood
intellectual development measures (general cognitive ability
at 2 and 4 years; intelligence at 7 and 1113 years) and later
adult educational attainment (collected in late 20s). Further,
we aimed to assess the contributions of parental factors
including years of schooling completed, socioeconomic
status, and intelligence. In doing so, we sought to identify
any age-dependent associations between childhood intelligence and education attainment along with parental factors
that may exist.

METHODS
Participants
Individuals were from the population-based Port Pirie
Cohort Study (Baghurst et al., 1992; McFarlane et al., 2013;
McMichael et al., 1988; Tong, Baghurst, McMichael, Sawyer,
& Mudge, 1996). The cohort included 723 live births
between September 1979 and October 1982 in the regional
industrial town of Port Pirie (within 30 km) in South Australia (90% response rate).
All cohort participants were assessed periodically from
birth to 7 years, and then a subsample of those who had
completed the study at age 7 years was assessed between 11
and 13 years. All members of the cohort from birth were
approached in their late 20s (20082009) and 56% agreed to
participate (n = 402). Those who agreed to participate in
20082009 had a larger birth weight and gestational age,
their mothers were older at their birth and had lived in Port
Pirie for longer, and their parents were less likely to be
smokers, as compared with those who did not agree to
participateall differences were of small effect size. For full
details, please see McFarlane et al. (2013).
This analysis includes the 388 individuals who provided
educational attainment data in the 20082009 data collection wave. Fifty-five per cent were female (n = 213; n = 175
males), and individuals varied between 25 and 29 years at
the adult data collection wave (M = 36.94, standard deviation (SD) = .84 years). Ninety per cent of individuals were
firstborns (n = 344), and the remainder were second-borns
(n = 39).
MEASURES
Research psychologists administered all of the testing sessions to the children and the mother, and were blinded to
the results of previous cognitive assessments.
Measures collected from child
Bayley Mental Development Index (child at 2 years of age)
The mental scale of the Bayley Mental Development Index
has 163 items and was used to assess the development of
each child at 2226 months of age (Bayley, 1969). It covers
memory, learning, problem solving capacity, early language
and speech development, and the understanding of object
permanence. The raw Bayley Mental Scale is converted to
the age-normed Mental Development Index with a mean
score of 100 and SD of 16.
McCarthy Scales of Childrens Abilities (child at four years)
The McCarthy Scales of Childrens Abilities were used to
assess the developmental competence of each child at 4 years
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Predictors of educational attainment

of age (MCarthy, 1972). The McCarthy Scales consists of five
subscales including: verbal, perceptual performance, quantitative, memory, and motor skill tasks. The first three
subscales are combined to produce a general cognitive index
with a mean of 50 and a SD of 10, which provides an
age-normed index of cognitive functioning.
Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children (child at 7 and
1113 years)
The revised version of the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for
Children (WISC-R) was used to assess general intelligence at
7 years of age, and between 11 and 13 years (Wechsler,
1974). It was designed for children aged between 6 and 16
years of age and included 10 subtests. The age-normed fullscale intelligence quotient (IQ) had a mean score of 100,
with an SD of 15.
Educational attainment (of child; 2529 years)
The total number of years of schooling (primary and secondary school, as well as any tertiary studies) was calculated
from questions asked at the 20082009 data collection wave.
Cumulative blood lead
The Port Pirie Cohort Study began primarily to investigate
the effect of lead on physical and cognitive outcomes in
children, as Port Pirie hosts a lead smelting plant (Baghurst
et al., 1985; McMichael, Baghurst, Robertson, Vimpani, &
Wigg, 1985; Vimpani, McMichael, Robertson, & Wigg,
1985). Methods for blood collection and lead calculation are
detailed most recently in McFarlane et al. (2013). Variables
assessing cumulative blood lead concentration up to four
assessment ages (e.g., up to 2 years, 4 years, 7, years and
1113 years) were used within each subregression with child
cognitive performance/intelligence as the outcome (2, 4, 7,
and 1113 years). Notably, within this sample blood lead
concentration has been found to relate to small cognitive
deficits (Baghurst et al., 1992; Tong et al., 1996), but not
the trajectory of cognitive development (Tong, Baghurst,
Sawyer, Burns, & McMichael, 1998) or adult psychiatric
diagnosis in this cohort (McFarlane et al., 2013).
Measures collected from parents
Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-Revised (maternal; when
child was between 3 and 4 years)
Maternal intelligence was measured using the Wechsler
Adult Intelligence Scale-Revised (Wechsler, 1981) when the
child was between 3 and 4 years. Notably, the cohort
includes siblings, in which case maternal intelligence was
only taken once (when the first child was 34 years).
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Maternal and paternal schooling

The number of years of secondary school completed was
reported for the mother and father of each child. Because of
questionnaire design, any further study was not reordered
however in this sample only 16% of mothers and 20% of
fathers completed secondary school.
Maternal and paternal occupational prestige
Occupational prestige of both the mother and father was
assessed via the Daniel Scale as a proxy of socioeconomic
status (Daniel, 1984). The Daniel Scale was developed on an
Australian sample and uses a 7-point scale, from 1 to 7 to
indicate occupational prestige, where a lower score equates
to a more prestigious occupation, which is usually associated
with high socioeconomic status. These data were collected at
baseline, usually within the first trimester of pregnancy of
the child later followed in the study.
Statistical analysis
There were missing data cross all variables except the
outcome of education attainment for all n = 388. The percentage of missing data was (from n = 388 total) age 2 cognitive performance (3%), age 4 cognitive performance (9%),
age 7 IQ (14%), age 1113 IQ (38%), maternal IQ (25%),
maternal occupational prestige (1%), paternal occupational
prestige (1%), maternal schooling (2%), paternal schooling
(9%), 2 years blood lead (19%), 4 years blood lead (26%), 7
years blood lead (29%), and 1113 years blood lead (45%).
A structural equation model was considered to test associations between educational attainment and childhood
cognitive/IQ measures (see Fig. 1 for a simplified version of
the model fitted). The model was fitted in Mplus (Muthn &
Muthn, Los Angeles, CA, USA) and estimated using full
information maximum likelihood (FIML) estimation. Continuous variables with missing values were estimated within
the model via the FIML method under the missing at
random assumption. Model fit was assessed using standard
fit indices such as the root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA), standardised root mean square residual
(SRMR), and the comparative fit index (CFI).
RESULTS
Descriptions of key variables included in the statistical model
are given in Table 1, and correlations between these variables are presented in Table 2. It can be seen that the vast
majority of variables were significantly correlated with each
other in expected directions. For example, all child
cognitive/IQ measures were significantly positively correlated and maternal IQ was positively correlated with all of
these child assessments. Notably, the measure of maternal

64

H.A.D. Keage et al.

Figure 1 Simplified version of the statistical model fitted. Notably, all parental factors and child sex were entered as separate variables in the
full model.
Table 1

Participant characteristics of sample

Educational attainment
(number of years of
education completed)
2 years cognitive ability
(Bayley Mental)
4 years cognitive ability
(McCarthy)
7 years (WISC-R)
1113 years intelligence
(WISC-R)
Maternal intelligence
(WAIS)
Maternal high school
attainmenta
Paternal high school
attainmenta

Mean

SD

Minimum

Maximum

13.88

2.02

19

109.14

15.24

52

150

50.48

9.04

24

79

104.37
99.98

14.11
12.31

52
54

146
145

93.79

11.26

69

141

3.48

0.99

3.51

1.06

Five years signifying high school completion in South Australia

(notably, there were two reports of 6 years, which likely represents a
repeat year).

and paternal occupational prestige (Daniel Scale) uses a scale

where lower numbers represents more prestige than higher
numbers; therefore, maternal and paternal occupational
prestige correlated negatively with cognitive and IQ assessments. The only exception from the broad pattern of significant correlations was maternal occupational prestige, which
only significantly correlated with maternal IQ, maternal
schooling, and paternal schooling.
Results from the model are presented in Table 3, and significant effects are illustrated in Fig. 2. Fit indices indicated
fair to good model fit (RMSEA index .06, 90% CI = .04, .075;
SRMR = .052; CFI = .907).
It was found that educational attainment (i.e., the number
of years of education the child completed by their late 20s)

was significantly associated with number of years of schooling

completed by their father (standardised beta = .227, standard
error = .065, p = .001) and IQ at 7 years (standardised
beta = .218, standard error = .120, p = .032). That is, for each
additional year of high school completed by the father, the
child completed on average, nearly half a year more education (any schooling and tertiary studies). Further, for each
additional IQ point at age 7, that an individual on average
completed nearly half a month more education by their late
20stranslating to a 1-year educational attainment difference between the bottom and top of the average IQ range
(i.e., IQ score of 85115). When taking into account all other
model variables, educational attainment was not significantly
associated with any other childhood cognitive ability or IQ
measure (i.e., at 2 and 4 years, and in early adolescence;
however, notably the effect was consistent but failed to reach
conventional significance levels at early adolescence with
p = .099), maternal IQ, or with maternal schooling, parental
occupational prestige, and the sex of the child.
In terms of subregression results within the model, it was
evident that childhood cognitive ability was a highly stable
construct with each cognitive/IQ measurement related to
the one taken prior (i.e., 4 years related to 2 years, standardised beta = .360, standard error = .052, p < .001; 7 years
related to 4 years, standardised beta = .377, standard
error = .050, p < .001; and 1113 years related to 7 years,
standardised beta = .742, standard error = .038, p < .001).
Further, maternal IQ had a large effect on early childhood
cognition and IQ, with positive relationships when the child
was 2 years (standardised beta = .324, standard error = .070,
p < .001), 4 years (standardised beta = .272, standard
error = .073, p < .001), and 7 years (standardised Beta =
.195, standard error = .069, p = .004); however, the
2014 The Australian Psychological Society

.292
.000
.094
.070
.146
.006
.209
.000
.208
.001
.276
.000
.195
.000
.362
.000
.064
.207
.077
.131
.094
.069
.082
.125
.088
.108
.072
.267
.127
.031
.218
.000
.105
.048

.292
.000
.173
.001
.182
.001
.205
.000
.213
.002
.229
.000
.258
.000

.414
.000
.379
.000
.415
.000
.483
.000
.412
.000
.472
.000
.449
.000
.37
.000
.748
.000

.304
.000
.528
.000

2014 The Australian Psychological Society

Maternal occup prestige

Paternal schooling

Maternal schooling

Maternal IQ

1113 years IQ

7 years IQ

4 years cognition

2 years cognition

r
p
r
p
r
p
r
p
r
p
r
p
r
p
r
p
r
p

.340
.000

.463
.000
.538
.000
.498
.000

.301
.000
.12
.021
.163
.002
.293
.000
.239
.000
.521
.000

Paternal occup
prestige
Maternal occup
prestige
7 years IQ

Paternal
schooling
Maternal
schooling
Maternal
IQ
1113
years IQ
4 years
cognition
2 years
cognition

Childhood cognition/IQ

65

Table 3 Full results from the SEM

Educational attainment

Table 2

Correlations and their significance between key study variables

Parental factors

Predictors of educational attainment

Standardised Standard
estimate
error
p-value
Educational attainment as outcome
2 years intelligence
4 years intelligence
7 years intelligence
1113 years intelligence
Maternal intelligence
Maternal schooling
Paternal schooling
Maternal occupational prestige
Paternal occupational prestige
Sex
1113 years intelligence as outcome
7 years intelligence
Maternal intelligence
Maternal schooling
Paternal schooling
Maternal occupational prestige
Paternal occupational prestige
Sex
Cumulative lead to 1113 years
7 years intelligence as outcome
4 years intelligence
Maternal intelligence
Maternal schooling
Paternal schooling
Maternal occupational prestige
Paternal occupational prestige
Sex
Cumulative lead to 7 years
4 years cognition as outcome
2 years intelligence
Maternal intelligence
Maternal schooling
Paternal schooling
Maternal occupational prestige
Paternal occupational prestige
Sex
Cumulative lead to 4 years
2 years cognition as outcome
Maternal intelligence
Maternal schooling
Paternal schooling
Maternal occupational prestige
Paternal occupational prestige
Sex
Cumulative lead to 2 years

.048
.018
.218
.168
.102
.052
.227
.084
.042
.112

.069
.072
.102
.102
.077
.068
.065
.054
.064
.112

.492
.805
.032
.099
.182
.452
.001
.122
.513
.319

.742
.038
.008
.031
.007
.049
.221
.000

.038
.063
.051
.051
.042
.049
.081
.000

<.001
.541
.872
.548
.870
.325
.006
.498

.377
.195
.090
.057
.014
.092
.018
.001

.050
.069
.061
.058
.050
.057
.095
.001

<.001
.004
.140
.325
.770
.108
.847
.513

.360
.272
.003
.033
.005
.055
.020
.001

.052
.073
.063
.061
.052
.058
.100
.001

<.001
<.001
.965
.590
.919
.342
.842
.676

.324
.035
.045
.092
.016
.394
.000

.070
.067
.067
.054
.063
.100
.001

<.001
.596
.500
.091
.795
<.001
.806

Note. Bold characters and values denote p < .05.

association between maternal IQ and childhood IQ in early

adolescence (1113 years) was not significant (standardised
beta = .038, standard error = .063, p = .541).
Although years of paternal schooling showed the strongest
relationship with the childs educational attainment, paternal
schooling was not significantly related to the childs
IQ/cognitive ability in the model (at all measurement points;
notably, paternal schooling was significantly correlated with
all child cognitive/IQ measures). Maternal years of schooling
and parental occupational prestige were not significantly

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H.A.D. Keage et al.

Figure 2

Diagram showing significant (indicated by arrow) effects from the structural equation model (SEM), with standardised betas.

related to any child measure (cognitive ability/IQ or educational attainment), and only related to maternal IQ, within
the model.
Sex was related to two childhood cognitive ability/IQ
scoresat 2 years (standardised beta = .394, standard
error = .100, p < .001) and in early adolescence
(standardised beta = .221, standard error = .081, p =
.006)meaning that girls outperformed boys at 2 years and
boys outperformed girls in early adolescence. Blood lead
concentrations were not associated with cognitive performance at any age, when taking into account covariates,
within the model.

DISCUSSION
In this large Australian sample, the best predictors of education attainment by the late 20s were intelligence scores at 7
years and paternal schooling. Cognitive ability at 2 and 4
years, and intelligence in early adolescence, did not account
for additional significant variance in education attainment in
the full model. Despite the fathers schooling having a large
effect on educational attainment of the child, it was not
significantly associated (taking into account other model
variables) to the cognitive ability of the child across their
development.

Intelligence appeared to be highly stable trait, which aligns

with over a century of research into the construct (Deary,
2012) and recent published work in a longitudinal child
sample (Bornstein et al., 2006). The predictive strength
increased with age, that is, age 7 intelligence predicted early
adolescent intelligence much better than age 4 to age 7, and
age 2 to age 4. One reason for this is that age 7 and early
adolescent function were both measured via the WISC-R,
whereas measures taken at ages 2 and 4 years related to
cognitive function and not intelligence per se (there was no
Wechsler scale suitable for these age groups at the time).
Another reason for the increase in predictive power of
intelligence/cognition with age is that is has been known for
a long time that infant and preschool intelligence measurement is less stable than measures taken later in childhood
(Anderson, 1939; Bayley, 1933). Similar to our results, intelligence has been reported to be relatively stable between 7
years of age and early adolescence (Moffitt, Caspi, Harkness,
& Silva, 1993).
All childhood cognitive ability/intelligence measurements
significantly correlated with educational attainment by the
late 20s. Intelligence at 7 years was the only significant
predictor within the model, and given cognitive and intelligence scores were highly correlated, this means that age
seven intelligence explained most variance (note: children in
this cohort would have started school at 5 years). The reason
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Predictors of educational attainment

that age 7, over other ages, carried this weight may reflect
slight variations in influences from the environment or agerelated genetic expression, as intelligence has an inherited
component (Benyamin et al., 2013) that overlaps with educational achievement (Calvin et al., 2012). As a child ages,
environmental influences on intelligence decrease and
genetic influences increase (Bartels, Rietveld, Van Baal, &
Boomsma, 2002), and the underlying stability of intelligence
over childhood is driven by genetics (Bartels et al., 2002;
Petrill et al., 2004).
It also may be that case that cognitive abilities measured at
2 and 4 years were not significant predictors of educational
attainment because of the aforementioned measurement
instability or that these measures taken prior to school entry
do not relate to educational attainment as well as those
taken after school entry (i.e., there is an interaction between
intelligence and educational experience). The effect for early
adolescent intelligence (i.e., in association with educational
attainment) did approach conventional significance levels
(standardised beta = .168, standard error = .102, p = .099). It
is of note that social disadvantage leads to a reduction in
intelligence between 6 and 11 years at a magnitude similar
to this cohort (note average intelligence dropped from an
average of 104 at 7 years to 100 in early adolescence in this
cohort; see Table 1; Breslau et al., 2001). There is a possibility that social disadvantages manifest in the regional industrial town cohort setting led to a drop in measured
intelligence in adolescence, which meant that the earlier
intelligence measurement at age 7 more closely reflected
mental capacity and therefore later education attainment.
The influence of paternal factors on child intelligence are
at odds with Johnson et al. (2010) who reported that paternal socioeconomic status was positively related, and paternal
educational attainment negatively related, to childhood
intelligence at 11 years of age. In the subregression looking
at predictors of adolescent intelligence in this sample, paternal (nor maternal) factors had an effect. Although generational, geographical, and cultural differences likely drove
these differential findings in part (Johnson et al., 2010
employed the 1936 Scottish Lothian Birth Cohort), this
difference is likely driven by our study including age 7
intelligence, which accounted for the majority of variance.
Our results were somewhat in line with Lager et al. (2012),
who reported that paternal education was related to the
educational attainment of the child at 20 years. However,
Lager et al. (2012) also reported paternal education was
related to the intelligence of the child at 10 and 20 years. We
found no relationships between paternal education and
childhood cognitive ability/intelligence (in full model),
rather only relationships between maternal intelligence
which Lager et al. (2012) was unable to include in their
model. Maternal schooling did not appear to affect educational attainment in the full model; however, maternal intel 2014 The Australian Psychological Society

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ligence was strongly associated with child cognitive ability/

intelligence (Bayley, 1955; Breslau et al., 2001; Der et al.,
2006), with some attenuation in this relationship in
adolescence.
The relationship between childhood cognitive function/
intelligence and later educational attainment is obviously
more complex than our model may suggest. It is likely that
non-cognitive factors play a large role in the intergenerational transmission of social advantages (Ackerman,
Chamorro-Premuzic, & Furnham, 2011; Furnham &
Moutafi, 2012; Gale, Batty, & Deary, 2008; Pearson et al.,
2011; Sanson et al., 2011; Slominski, Sameroff, Rosenblum,
& Kasser, 2011). However, in a large New Zealand study, the
positive relationship between intelligence at 79 years of age
and later education achievement held when co-varying for
early conduct problems and family, social, and childhood
circumstances (Fergusson, John Horwood, & Ridder, 2005).
This study is not without limitations. The two earliest
measures of childhood cognitive development (i.e., at 2
years the Bayley Mental Development Index and at 4 years
the McCarthy Scales of Childrens Abilities) were not the
same, nor the same as those employed at later assessments
(WISC-R). At the time of data collection (1980s), the
Wechsler intelligence test for pre-schoolers (the Wechsler
Preschool and Primary Scale of Intelligence) was only valid
from 4 and a half years; therefore, the Bayley and McCarthy
scales were employed, which are measures of general cognitive ability and not intelligence per se. These scales
however have shown good correlations with other standardised intelligence tests (Bayley, 1969; Hack et al., 2005), and
the Bayley Scale has also shown good predictive validity in
terms of later intelligence score, if taken after 18 months
(Kopp & McCall, 1982), and our own results show that the
McCarthy Scale score at 5 years was significantly related to
the WISC-R at 7 years.
Another limitation is that educational attainment was
only ascertained in the late 20s (2529 years of age), and at
the time of data collection 14% of the sample were still in
full-time education and 5% in part-time education.
However, the timing of data collection is also a positive, as
education attainment is usually measured in late adulthood
in large cohort studies, which introduces sample biases (e.g.,
survivor effect) and issues with recall reliability. We also
measured educational attainment as the number of years of
school and tertiary studies completed, we did not measure
academic performance/achievement (e.g., test scores),
where relationships may be different (Deary, Strand, Smith,
& Fernandes, 2007).
Our findings provide theoretical support for childhood
intelligence and educational attainment having independent
effects on later morbidity and mortality, in that we have
shown that do not relate to one underlying mental-ability
construct. For example, it has been reported that educational

68

H.A.D. Keage et al.

attainment and not intelligence is associated with smoking

while pregnant (Gale et al., 2009) and midlife obesity
(Lawlor et al., 2006), and that intelligence is more strongly
associated with dementia in late life than education
(Schmand, Smit, Geerlings, & Lindeboom, 1997). Further,
cognitive function in late life is independently related to
both early adulthood intelligence and educational attainment (Plassman et al., 1995).
The number of years of education a child completed
appeared most closely related to the number of years of high
school that their father completed and their own intelligence
at age 7. These findings demonstrate that when taking into
account parental factors, the relationship between childhood
intellect and education attainment by the mid-20s is age
dependent, with age 7 intelligence the best predictor. The
relationships between parental factors and child intelligence/
cognitive ability and educational attainment were complex.
Maternal intelligence was strongly related to the childs early
life cognitive ability and intelligence, but not to the childs
educational attainment in adulthoodthe reverse was true
for paternal schooling. These findings highlight the complex
intergenerational transmission of social advantages and
mechanisms for the independent effects of education and
intelligence on later morbidly and mortality.

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