Prior studies have found college attendance to boost self‐esteem and mastery in young adults. Yet, college attendance itself is likely influenced by self‐esteem and mastery levels experienced in adolescence. And both are likely influenced by adolescent cognitive ability and academic achievement. Using data from the NLSY79‐YA, we illustrate the difficulties in isolating the positive effect of college on young adult self‐concept. First, we estimate adolescent self‐concept trajectories for respondents and analyze whether these trajectories are predictive of college attendance and degree attainment. Second, we assess whether the inclusion of adolescent self‐concept trajectories significantly reduces the beneficial effect of college on young adult self‐esteem and mastery. We also investigate the complex temporal relationship between adolescent characteristics, debt accumulation, and young adult self‐concept. Our findings show that the positive effects of college attainment and debt accumulation on young adult self‐concept are significantly reduced when measures of adolescent self‐concept and cognitive ability are included. These results imply that the benefit of going to college or acquiring debt may be overstated when adolescent characteristics are not taken into consideration.

中文翻译：

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隔离大学学历和债务积累对年轻人自我概念的影响的挑战

先前的研究发现，上大学可以提高年轻人的自尊心和掌握能力。但是，大学出勤率本身可能会受到青春期自尊和精通水平的影响。两者都可能受到青少年认知能力和学业成绩的影响。使用来自NLSY79-YA的数据，我们说明了隔离大学对年轻成年人自我概念的积极影响方面的困难。首先，我们估计受访者的青春期自我概念轨迹，并分析这些轨迹是否可预测大学出勤率和学历。其次，我们评估是否包含青少年的自我概念轨迹是否会显着降低大学对年轻成年人的自尊心和掌握能力的有益影响。我们还研究了青春期特征，债务积累和年轻成年人自我概念之间的复杂时间关系。我们的研究结果表明，如果将青少年的自我概念和认知能力纳入考量，则大学成就和债务积累对年轻成年人自我概念的积极影响会大大降低。这些结果表明，如果不考虑青春期特征，上大学或获得债务的收益可能被夸大了。