Unemployment and School Motivation: the case of truancy

Abstract

This paper uses data from the Scottish School Leavers Surveys to examine the influence of rising unemployment rates on levels of truancy among school pupils. Rates of truancy among fourth‐year pupils declined over a period when national unemployment figures were rising sharply. Truancy rates were also lower among pupils in areas of higher unemployment. Subject to some reservations, the data suggest that rising unemployment increases pupil motivation and thereby acts as an instrument of social control in schools as well as in the labour market; less equivocally, the data challenge current arguments alleging the demotivating and demoralising effect of unemployment on school pupils.