Syntes: Early to rise? The effect of daily start times on academic performance (2012)

Källa: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.econedurev.2012.07.006 (Economics of Education Review 31(6))

Verified content

• [abstract] Data on all middle-school students in Wake County, North Carolina, 1999–2006; uses variation in start times within schools over time (and across schools) to estimate the causal effect of start times on test scores.
• [abstract] Within schools, a later start gives about a two-percentile-point gain in maths test scores (roughly 14% of the Black–white test-score gap); similar results for reading and when using variation across schools.
• [abstract] The effect is stronger for students in the lower part of the test-score distribution.
• [abstract] Evidence supports increased sleep as a mechanism.
• [abstract, highlights] A 1-hour later start leads to a two-percentile-point gain in maths.
• [publisher preview of the introduction, not the full results] Using both sources of variation, a 1-hour delay raises maths and reading scores by about three percentile points; within schools about two (maths) and one and a half (reading); later-starting students also had fewer absences, watched less television and did more homework.

Limits

• [assessment] Natural variation from bus scheduling, not random assignment; middle schools (grades 6–8) in one US county. Full text not read (Elsevier paywall; SSRN version blocked from the box).

Added 2026-10-16 by the project (broadening, Jonatan approved 2026-10-16). Verified 2026-10-16 by the project against the sources named in each line. [abstract] = from the published abstract; [full text] = read in the full text; [assessment] = the project's own judgement, not a fact from the paper.