There has been long discussion in educational psychology about the individual factors that promote pupils' sense of school belonging during secondary education. However, the literature on the school factors associated with these outcomes seems to be less informed. By utilising an ecological-systemic approach, the present study aimed to consider…

Results of the PISA 2018 tests show that the average score in mathematics of the Spanish students is below the European Union and the OECD averages. These differences may be caused by factors related to the student or by those related to the school the student belongs to. The aim of this work is to identify the variables causing the differences in…

The OECD Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) examines what students around the world know and can do. This volume -- Volume III, Creative Minds, Creative Schools -- is one of five volumes presenting the results of the eighth round of the PISA assessment. For the first time, in 2022, PISA assessed students' capacity to engage in…

Much debate exists concerning the factorial dimensionality of student well-being. We contribute to this debate by drawing on PISA 2018 data from a total of 61,722 students, 2528 schools, and nine countries. For our investigation, we test multiple associated measurement models for convergent, discriminant, and concurrent validity, model fit, and…

Recent studies reiterate the importance of mathematical literacy and the identification of skills, knowledge and cognitive processes which contribute to composite test scores to facilitate targeted remediation and extension activities. To this end, the current article examines data from the 2012 cycle of the Programme for International Student…

Effective collaborative problem solving comprises cognitive dimensions, in which men tend to outperform women, and social dimensions in which women tend to outperform men. We extend research on between-country differences in gender gaps by considering collaborative problem solving and its association with two indicators of societal-level gender…

A sizeable literature -- spanning education, sociology and economics -- has investigated the issue of parental school preferences and school choice. A notable gap in the existing evidence base is an exploration of how such preferences differ between mothers and fathers. We present new cross-national findings on this matter, drawing on survey data…

The advantages and disadvantages of single-sex schooling continue to be a source of policy and public debate. Previous empirical evidence is somewhat ambiguous, with some studies finding a positive impact of single-sex schooling on education achievement and others finding no differences across school types. The relationship between single-sex…

This narrative systematic review examined relationships between school attainment, socio-economic status and gender in the United Kingdom from 2000 to 2012. The influence of socio-economic status was considered at the individual and school level, while gender was examined at the individual level. To ensure consistency among included studies, the…

In most education systems, students with an immigrant background perform worse academically than do native students. However, in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) differences emerge in the opposite direction and the national-expatriate gap in academic performance is equivalent to almost three years of schooling. This gap is a concern in the UAE,…

I brought together two strands of literature, one investigating the moderate but persistent underachievement of girls in mathematics in most countries, and the other examining the role of self-efficacy and other self-beliefs in predicting behaviour and achievement. I implemented detailed decompositions of the gender mathematics gap, both at the…

The purpose of this study is to examine the characteristics of US schools associated with two measures of scientific literacy (content knowledge and "procedural and epistemic" knowledge) using the 2015 Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) data. Because outcomes are nested within students, and students within schools, a…

Few studies on male-female inequalities in education have elaborated on whether school characteristics affect girls' and boys' educational performance differently. This study investigated how school resources, being schools' socioeconomic composition, proportion of girls, and proportion of highly educated teachers, and school practices, being…

Position effects (PE) cause decreasing probabilities of correct item responses towards the end of a test. We analysed PEs in science, mathematics and reading tests administered in the German extension to the PISA 2006 study with respect to their variability at the student- and school-level. PEs were strongest in reading and weakest in mathematics.…

The aim of this paper is to analyse the students' performance in the mathematical competency aspect of the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2015 tests and to compare 5 Spanish regions in this respect -- Navarra, Castile-León and Catalonia, with results above the national average; and Extremadura and Andalusia, with results…