• Graduate Programs
    • Tinbergen Institute Research Master in Economics
      • Why Tinbergen Institute?
      • Research Master
      • Admissions
      • PhD Vacancies
      • Selected PhD Placements
    • Facilities
    • Research Master Business Data Science
    • Education for external participants
    • Summer School
    • Tinbergen Institute Lectures
    • PhD Vacancies
  • Research
  • Browse our Courses
  • Events
    • Summer School
      • Tuition Fees and Payment
      • Applied Public Policy Evaluation
      • Deep Learning
      • Development Economics
      • Economics of Blockchain and Digital Currencies
      • Economics of Climate Change
      • The Economics of Crime
      • Foundations of Machine Learning with Applications in Python
      • From Preference to Choice: The Economic Theory of Decision-Making
      • Inequalities in Health and Healthcare
      • Marketing Research with Purpose
      • Markets with Frictions
      • Sustainable Finance
      • Tuition Fees and Payment
      • Business Data Science Summer School Program
    • Events Calendar
    • Events Archive
    • Tinbergen Institute Lectures
    • 2026 Tinbergen Institute Opening Conference
    • Annual Tinbergen Institute Conference
  • News
  • Job Market Candidates
  • Alumni
    • PhD Theses
    • Master Theses
    • Selected PhD Placements
    • Key alumni publications
    • Alumni Community

Golsteyn, \BartH.H.\, Non, A. and Zölitz, U. (2021). The impact of peer personality on academic achievement Journal of Political Economy, 129(4):1052--1099.


  • Affiliated author
  • Publication year
    2021
  • Journal
    Journal of Political Economy

This paper provides evidence of a novel facet of peer effects by showing that peer personality influences academic achievement.We exploit random assignment of students to university sections and find that students perform better in the presence of persistent peers. The impact of peer persistence is enduring, as students exposed to persistent peers at the beginning of their studies continue to achieve higher grades in subsequent periods. The personality peer effects that we document are distinct from other observable peer characteristics and suggest that peer personality traits affect human capital accumulation.