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17.1 Introduction

Families and schools are important partners in the education of children and they share the responsibility for children’s achievement, and this requires the collaboration between parents and schools (Epstein 2010). Originating from this necessity, the concept of parent involvement refers to a wide range of activities and connections among schools, families and communities (Sheldon and Epstein 2005).

The inclusion of parents as partners in the education of children has arguably many advantages (Pena 2000). One of the advantages brought through parental involevement is the enhancement of student achievement (Jeynes 2003; Rameriz 2001; Wehlburg 1996). Furthermore, the parents who are involved in their children’s education are likely to develop high educational aspirations for them (Cai et al. 1997). Students may benefit both academically and in terms of their development when their parents are engaged with and involved in their education (Garcia 2014). As Garcia (2014) elaborates, regarding their education, these students tend to have higher grades, test scores , school attendance , graduation rates , homework readiness and educational aspirations . Concerning their development, these students may have higher motivation , better self-esteem , a high level of self-efficacy , positive attitudes , decreased use of drugs /alcohol and fewer occurrences of violent behavior .

In the literature, parental involvement models have been developed by Epstein (2010), Grolnick and Slowiaczek (1994) and Hoge et al. (1997). Although there are some significant differences among these models they also overlap to some extent. For example, one common point is the concern with parental involvement in connection with students’ academic life rather than with their behavior or with other outcomes (Kugler 2009). We will elaborate on Epstein’s model which is widely used in the relevant literature.

Through her research Epstein (2010) has developed a multidimensional framework of six different types of family involvement. Epstein et al. (2009) have stated that the purpose of the “Six Types of Involvement ” model is to improve schools’ collaboration and partnership with the families of students , increasing thus students’ achievement. To put it in another way, the primary objective of this framework is to help schools engage with parents in order the latter to become partners in their children’s education (Epstein and Hollifield 1996). The six types of parental involvement are examined and explained below (Epstein and Salinas 2004):

Type 1 [Parenting ]: Assist families with parenting skills, family support, understanding child and adolescent development and setting home conditions to support learning at each age and grade level. Assist schools in understanding families’ backgrounds, cultures and goals for children.

Type 2 [Communicating ]: Communicate with families about school programs and student progress. Create two-way communication channels between school and home.

Type 3 [Volunteering ]: Improve the recruitment, training, activities and schedules of volunteers in order to involve families as volunteers and as audiences at the school or in other locations. Enable educators to work with the volunteers who support students and the school.

Type 4 [Learning at Home ]: Encourage families to get involved with their children in academic learning at home , including homework, goal setting and other curriculum-related activities. Encourage teachers to design homework that enables students to share and discuss interesting tasks.

Type 5 [Decision Making]: Include families as participants in school decisions, governance and advocacy activities through school councils or through improvement teams, committees and parent organizations.

Type 6 [Collaborating with the community ]: Link the resources and services for families, students and the school with community groups, including businesses, agencies, cultural and civic organizations and colleges or universities. Enable all the relevant actors to offer services to the community.

This framework can also be used both at home and at school as a tool to enhance the achievement of children and to inform both educators and parents about how to achieve this purpose (Epstein 2010). To make the different types of parental involvement more understandable and clear, Table 17.1, which has been adapted from the work of Epstein (2010, p. 85), presents the definition and sample practices for each type of parental involvement.

Table 17.1 Epstein’s framework of six types of involvement and sample practices
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Parental involvement as well as parental expectations and styles may affect children’s educational attainments (Pearce 2006). Parental involvement in education influences student achievement since any social and cultural gaps between the school and home may result in poor academic achievement (Comer 1980). Given the importance of parental involvement, schools have to increase the level of parental inclusion into the schooling of children (Davies 2002). The educational level of parents may be another additional factor affecting the parents’ involvement in their child’s education (Becker and Epstein 1982). Likewise, Dauber and Epstein (1993) concluded that the parents who are more educated have higher levels of involvement in their children’s education than the less educated ones. Although both teachers and parents may share the belief that parent involvement is quite important for the child’s development, the absence of parent involvement may result from a number different family factors, such as lack of time, energy and economic resources, lack of knowledge and failure to understand the role parents can play, as well as from various school factors such as poor reporting practices or hostility toward parents (Eccles and Harold 1993).

Taking into account the fact that there are a number of different studies on the relationship between parent involvement and student achievement , this study aimed to test the following hypotheses bringing together the results from previous research:

  • H 1 Parent involvement has a positive effect on student achievement.

  • H 2 Publication type is a moderator for the positive effect of parent involvement on student achievement.

  • H 3 Sample group (education level) is a moderator for the positive effect of parent involvement on student achievement.

  • H 4 School subject or assessment type is a moderator for the positive effect of parent involvement on student achievement.

  • H 5 Country (culture) is a moderator for the positive effect of parent involvement on student achievement.

  • H 6 The year of the studies is a moderator for the positive effect of parent involvement on student achievement.

17.2 Method

17.2.1 Study Design

In this study, the effect of parent involvement on student achievement was tested with a meta-analysis design.

17.2.2 Review Strategy and Criteria for Inclusion/Exclusion

To determine the research studies to include in the meta-analysis , the Science-Direct, Proquest and Ebsco academic databases were used to conduct a literature review. For this process, the terms involvement and achievement/ success included in the titles of the studies were used to screen the research studies. The start and end dates for the research studies included in the research were identified as 2005 and February 2016. Doctoral dissertations and peer-reviewed journals were included in the study.

Many strategies were used to identify the research studies that were appropriate for the meta-analysis of the study. First, a research study pool (1640 research studies) was established; it included all studies with involvement and achievement/success in their titles. The abstracts of these studies were reviewed, and all were found to be appropriate to include in the study. In the second stage, all research studies in the pool were examined in detail. The results of the examination found that 119 of the research studies in the pool were appropriate, and 1521 were not found to be suitable. The descriptive statistics of the 251 correlation coefficients obtained from 119 research studies included in the analysis are presented in Table 17.2.

Table 17.2 Characteristics of the studies included in the meta-analysis
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The criteria for inclusion of the research studies in the analysis study were identified as follows:

  • To have the statistical information necessary for correlational meta-analysis (n and r, or R 2 values )

  • To be a study measuring the correlation between parent involvement and student achievement /success

Reasons for not including a research study in the meta-analysis :

  • Having no quantitative data (qualitative research)

  • Not having a correlation coefficient

  • Not focusing on student achievement

  • Not focusing on parent involvement

17.2.3 Coding Process

The coding process was essentially a data sorting process used to ascertain which data were clear and suitable for the study. In this scope, a coding form was developed before the statistical analysis was conducted, and the coding was conducted according to the form. The main aim was to develop a specific coding system that allowed the study to see the entirety of the research studies in general and that would not miss any characteristics of each individual research study. The coding form developed in the study was comprised of:

  • References for the research,

  • Sample information,

  • Type of publication ,

  • Sample group ,

  • School subject or assessment type,

  • Country ,

  • The years of the studies ,

  • Data collection tool(s),

  • Quantitative values .

17.2.4 Statistical Processes

The effect size acquired in meta-analysis is a standard measure value used in the determination of the strength and direction of the relationship in the study (Borenstein et al. 2009). Pearson’s correlation coefficient (r) was determined to be the effect size in this study. Because the correlation coefficient has a value between +1 and −1, the r value calculated was evaluated by converting this value into the value as it appears in the z table (Hedges and Olkin 1985). Provided that more than one correlation value is given between the same structure categories in correlational meta-analysis studies, two different approaches are used in the determination of the one to be used in the meta-analysis (Borenstein et al. 2009; Kulinskaya et al. 2008). For this study, (i) first, if the correlations were independent, all the related correlations were included in the analysis and were considered to be independent studies, and (ii) if there were dependent correlations, then the highest correlation value was accepted. A random effect model was used for the meta-analysis processes in this study. The Comprehensive Meta-Analysis program was used in the meta-analysis process.

17.2.5 Moderator Variables

To determine the statistical significance of the differences between the moderators of the study, only the Q b values were used. Five moderator variables that were expected to have a role in the average effect size were identified in the study. The first of these considered is the type of publication as a moderator in regards to the relationship between parent involvement and student achievement . The second is the sample group which was thought to have a role on the average impact of parent involvement on student achievement. The rest are the school subject /assessment type, country , and years of the studies .

17.2.6 Publication Bias

A funnel plot for the research studies included in the meta-analysis of can be seen in Fig. 17.1. Evidence that publication bias affected the research studies included in the meta-analysis can be seen in Fig. 17.1. A serious asymmetry would be expected in the funnel plot if there were a publication bias. The concentration of plots on one side under the line of average effect size, particularly in the bottom section of the funnel, suggests the probability of a publication bias in the research studies. In this study, no evidence of partiality of the publications was observed in any of the 251 data subjected to meta-analysis .

Fig. 17.1
figure 1

Effect size funnel for publication bias

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Although no partiality in publications was observed in the funnel plot , the results of Duval and Tweedie’s trim and fill test, which was applied to determine the effect of partiality in publications acquired with the meta-analysis using the random effect model , are given in Table 17.3. As seen in Table 17.3, there is no difference between the effect observed and the artificial effect size created to fix the effect of the partiality of publications . The research on each side of the center line is symmetrical, and this is the indicator of non-difference. Because there is no evidence indicating lost data on either side of the center line, the difference between the fixed effect size and observed effect size is zero.

Table 17.3 Duval and Tweedie’s trim and fill test results
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17.3 Findings

Table 17.4 shows the results of the meta-analysis which examined the relationship between student achievement and parent involvement . The findings supported hypothesis H1 which argues that there is a positive relationship between student achievement and parent involvement. The effect size of parent involvement on student achievement was calculated to be .21. This value shows that parent involvement has a low level effect (see Cohen 1988) on student achievement.

Table 17.4 Findings regarding the relationship between student achievement and parent involvement : meta-analysis results
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The results of the moderator analysis showed that hypothesis H2 regarding the moderator role of publication type on the level of effect of parent involvement on student achievement is not confirmed. The level of effect of publication type on student achievement was not found to be significant (Q b = 0.285, p > .05) in the moderator analysis conducted through a random effects model . In particular, the publication types included in the meta-analysis have a low level significant effect on student achievement (thesis /dissertation [r = .22] and article [r = .21]). The effect sizes of these two publication types are almost the same.

The findings did not also provide support for hypothesis H3 which stated that the sample group (education level) plays a moderator role on the level of effect that parent involvement has on student achievement . Although the moderator analysis did not find a statistically significant difference between the levels of effect of the sample groups examined (Q b = 7.950, p > .05), the level of effect of parent involvement on student achievement is statistically significant and low for preschool, [r = .15], elementary school [r = .24], middle school [r = .23], high school [r = .22] and for mixed groups [r = .22] while it is not significant for university [r = .09].

Similarly, the moderator analysis disconfirmed hypothesis H4 which stated that school subject is a moderator variable for the effect of parent involvement on student achievement . There is no statistically significant difference in the level of effect of the school subjects analyzed (Q b  = 2.500, p > .05). In particular, the level of effect of parent involvement on student achievement is statistically significant and low for language [r = .21], mathematics [r = .24], science [r = .18] and general achievement [r = .20], whereas the moderator role of other subjects [r = .12] was not found to be significant.

The findings supported hypothesis H5 which stated that the country (culture) plays a moderator role for the effect of parent involvement on student achievement . The moderator analysis showed that the difference between the level of effect of studies from different countries was statistically significant (Q b  = 7.383, p < .05). In particular, it was found that vertical -collectivist [r = .29] and horizontal-individualist [r = .20] countries had a low level effect on student achievement. The countries with the highest level of effect were found to be the vertical-collectivist ones.

This research did not find any support for hypothesis H6 which hypothesized that publication year plays a moderator role in the effect of parent involvement on student achievement. The moderator analysis did not reveal a statistically significant difference in the level of effect of the different publication years of the research studies examined (Q b  = 3.322, p > .05). In particular, it was found that publication year has a low level effect on student achievement with regard to the publications dated between 2005 and 2008 [r = .25], between 2009 and 2012 [r = .22] and between 2013 and 2016 [r = .19].

17.4 Conclusion

A total of 119 research studies (with 378,069 participants) published between 2005 and 2016 were included in this meta-analysis study aiming to examine the magnitude of the effect size of parent involvement on student achievement . The type of publication , the sample group (education level), the school subject or assessment type, the country (culture) in which the research was carried out and the year in which the study was published were considered as moderator variables . The results of the meta-analysis showed that there is a low level positive effect of parent involvement on student performance . This finding is similar with the results of the meta-analysis studies conducted by Fan and Chen (2001) and Hill and Tyson (2009) while the meta-analysis studies conducted by Jeynes (2007, 2012) and by Jeynes (2005) and Sénéchal and Young (2008) found medium effect sizes and large effect sizes respectively regarding the relationship between parent involvement and student achievement. Another meta-analytic study by Jeynes (2003) showed that the effect sizes changed from low to large for different sample groups and achievement measures.

According to the results of the moderator variable analysis, the country from which the study samples were chosen has been found to play a moderator role in the effect of parental involvement on student achievement . The sample groups chosen from vertical -collectivist countries showed a higher level of effect than the sample groups from the horizontal-individualist countries. This may be the result of the properties of each group of countries in that the people from vertical-collectivist countries focus on enhancing the cohesion and status of their in-groups while the people from horizontal-individualist countries tend to focus on their uniqueness and self-reliance (Shavitt et al. 2011). Triandis and Gelfand (1998) define the concept of vertical collectivism as seeing the self as a part of a community (sample scale items: “Parents and children must stay together as much as possible”), while horizontal individualism is defined as seeing the self as fully autonomous (sample scale item: “I often do ‘my own thing’.”). Although the conducted meta-analysis studies about the effect of parental involvement on student achievement did not include this particular distinction of countries, these studies have used the variable of ethnicity or race as the moderator for the same effect. In particular, Fan and Chen (2001) have found that ethnicity showed relatively small moderating effect on the relationship between parental involvement and students ’ academic achievement. At the same time, Hill and Tyson (2009) concluded that the effect size of the different ethnicities was similar.

Regarding the other moderator variables such as the type of publication , sample group , school subject and the publication year of the studies, these yielded no statistically significant results for the effect of parental involvement on student achievement . In other words, these variables do not play a moderator role for the relationship between parental involvement and academic achievement of the students , since the effect size levels of these variables have quite similar average correlation coefficients . Fan and Chen (2001) has, however, concluded that the area of academic achievement, which we have called in this study as “school subject ”, has a strong moderating effect on the correlation coefficients between parental involvement and students ’ academic achievement . Our moderator analysis findings suggest that the effect sizes according to the subgroups of publication type , sample group , school subject and publication year do not differ from each other, hence we can conclude that the studies conducted yielded similar results for these kinds of variables. Moreover, the obtained effect sizes for the subgroups of publication type , sample group and school subject were higher than those found by Castro et al. (2015). Regarding, however, the various sample groups (education levels), our study has similar findings with the studies conducted by Castro et al. (2015) and Jeynes (2012) in that the primary and secondary education levels have the largest effect size . Although there are similar meta-analysis studies addressing the same issue with the present study, it is difficult to compare this research with these studies since the latter have included different moderator variables or they have used different statistical measures such as a t test. Additionally, Castro et al. (2015) suggested that some paradoxical results found in most of the analyzed studies can be explained by the complex nature of the construct ‘parental involvement’.

A general conclusion to be deduced from this research is that parent involvement is important for children’s education. In sum, the findings concerning the effect of parental involvement on student achievement/success /performance are presented below:

  • Parental involvement has a low level positive effect on student achievement [r = .21],

  • Country has been found to be a moderator variable for the relationship between parental involvement and student achievement, while the variables of publication type , sample group , school subject and publication year do not have a moderator role in this relationship.

Eccles and Harold (1993) have stated that the collaborative relationship between parents and schools seems to decrease rather than increase as children move through higher educational levels. Parents are important for children’s school performance , especially during the first years of schooling, since at that stage children are more dependent on their parents and need guidance. Accordingly, the level of parent involvement in children’s education may influence the educational life of children. It is recommended by this study to conduct furthet comparative and comprehensive meta-analysis studies using different moderator variables with the aim of examining the relationship between parental involvement and student achievement .