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Framing this as a pattern across the entire industrial world is a bit misleading. Looking through the data at Math Scores since 2015 shows big country level spl

by blululu 24d ago

Framing this as a pattern across the entire industrial world is a bit misleading. Looking through the data at Math Scores since 2015 shows big country level split: Japan: -3 S Korea: -1 Singapore: +1 Taiwan: +9 --- Germany: -45 France: -38 Sweden: -33 US: -10 This is an issue with the western industrialized world. Which ought to make the analysis simple since we can look at what those countries have done differently than their East Asian counterparts and stop pursing those actions as national policy *edit for formatting

bsoqk 24d ago
[flagged]
- rayiner 24d ago
  Yeah, it's useless to look at time-series changes in this data without accounting for the fact that, e.g., 29% of students in Germany now have a migration background. A huge chunk of German students are growing up with parents who don't speak German at home, of course that's going to cause test scores to decline.
  - jimaway123 24d ago
    [flagged]
  - my-next-account 24d ago
    Swedish scores sank for both Swedish and maths in "natives", 2nd gen and 3rd gen immigrants. Scores did not sink in Swedish for 1st gen immigrants. In other words: Everyone is getting worse, but some were already worse than others before.
cufjufxtx 24d ago
[flagged]
amadeoeoeo 24d ago
I see news and forums claiming the problem is screens/smartphones and social media. Given the big gap between the east and the west... does anybody know if these are somehow less used/abused in asian countries? Any other reason why this gap might happen? Thanks
- nixon_why69 24d ago
  Living in one Asian country, phone scrolling still happens with adults but kids get a lot of homework and definitely do it. Honestly excessive amounts, quantity over quality but at least studying is happening. If some third type of country didn't do doomscrolling but ignored their homework to play outside, that's better than scrolling but it's still not homework.
  - samudrijan 23d ago
    At what age does the homework kick in for kids growing up in Asia?
    - nixon_why69 23d ago
      Speaking for China specifically, and this is all word of mouth since my kids are at a posh international school (apply hate appriopriately): Elementary school is 8-5, longish day but not too bad on homework. Middle school (grades 6-9) there's been a recent drive to have less homework so they stay till only 7:00 (!) doing it at school and only a little take home done between dinner and bed. High school is your life revolves around homework, everyone realizes it's counterproductive to learning but they're all stuck in this trap grinding for the big exams that will shape the rest of your life. Key word neijuan. Actual Chinese (and other asian countries) can chime in where I'm mistaken.
- Tade0 24d ago
  Here's a data point that should help: Poland's math score dropped by just 5 points. As for other tests: Science: -4 Reading: -7. Much like with GDP per capita, my country is climbing the rankings, but only via walkover.
meindnoch 24d ago
[flagged]
MrBuddyCasino 24d ago
[flagged]
- BeetleB 24d ago
  Would love to see a more detailed breakdown. In the US, often the highest performers are children of immigrants.
  - rayiner 24d ago
    There is a big difference between different immigrant groups. In the U.S., children of immigrants are also often the lowest performers. The U.S. tracks test scores by race and not immigration status. But looking at test scores for hispanic students is a rough proxy because more than 60% of hispanic students are immigrants or the children of immigrants: https://www.equityinhighered.org/indicators/secondary-school-completion/naep-12th-grade-achievement-levels https://www.equityinhighered.org/indicators/secondary-school.... That means they probably grew up in a household where their parents weren’t native english speakers.
    - BeetleB 24d ago
      > There is a big difference between different immigrant groups. In the U.S., children of immigrants are also often the lowest performers. My comment did not preclude either of these from being true. I didn't say "On average, children of immigrants do better in the US." I said "often the highest performers are children of immigrants." > But looking at test scores for hispanic students is a rough proxy because more than 60% of hispanic students are immigrants or the children of immigrants: Looking at the test scores for Asians is also a rough proxy of children of immigrants, and you can see what your link shows: They are the lowest of all groups in being "below average", and the highest of all groups in the top category ("Advanced") - over double the next highest race in math, for example. I expected better reasoning from you, given the whole "Asian and child of immigrants" ;-) (As an aside, not sure how relevant your link is, given that it's from 2015, and the thread is about the shift from 2015 to now).
RGamma 24d ago
Sure you can torture your children with ever harsher "education", almost none of which matters in non-research positions. Then don't be surprised when they run out.
- JumpCrisscross 24d ago
  > you can torture your children with ever harsher "education" Harsh educations don’t work. Neither does modern coddling, prevalent in the West. If any adversity prompts a mental health crisis, you’re at a global disadvantage. Economically and, I’d argue, in terms of quality of life.
  - Huarache1 24d ago
    The issue is that Mental Health is genuinely a fleeting, seemingly slowly renewable resource brought down by either screens, stress, or something else. I believe that openly talking about it, while a great way to de-stigmatize it, may have inadvertently caused self-diagnoses and worsening symptoms to increase. There is also something else to be said about Mental Health, coming from one of the countries with the lowest rates of someone taking their own lives, and its not just due to underreporting. Peru probably isn't the best place to live, but the food, weather, people, and general culture which almost normalizes suffering in an almost Buddhist way (Sufre Peruano sufre! lit. Suffer Peruvian, Suffer!) might have something to do with a more robust mental health situation?
    - JumpCrisscross 24d ago
      > Mental Health is genuinely a fleeting, seemingly slowly renewable resource Is there a credible source for “mental health” being an extinguishable quantity? This sounds an awful lot like the battery hypothesis of longevity.
    - cindyllm 23d ago
      [dead]
    - Daishiman 23d ago
polski-g 24d ago
As they say, demographics is destiny.
Haven880 24d ago
Those top scorer countries just soooooo happen to have world lowest birthrate. Maybe it has to do with extraordinary pressure to succeed at all cost since one is baby?
- bayindirh 24d ago
  I don't think so. While I believe more in the student than the school for success, in the formative years, a good foundation is necessary, as somebody can't know better if they don't know anything. So, a good education system's effects are compounded for younger children w.r.t. higher education. So, these education systems need a check and tune-up to adapt them to current age and perform at their peak again.
- HSO 24d ago
  maybe check out ``western`` birth rates without immigration before spouting next time
justacrow 23d ago
While the examples above just draws trolls pushing an immigration angle, consider these other countries: Finland -45 Bulgaria -38 Malaysia -62 Israel -33 Serbia -44 Indonesia: -24 Full data is on Table 2.9, page 101 in the report: https://www.oecd.org/en/publications/pisa-2025-results-volume-i_73451bc5-en.html https://www.oecd.org/en/publications/pisa-2025-results-volum...
- blululu 23d ago
  You know I pulled these figures out of their table on the bus in to work. I selected the largest economies in the OECD (Germany, France, America, South Korean and Japan are the largest economies in the OECD). I added Taiwan and Singapore for context since my contention related to east Asia and only two countries is unbalanced. I should have added UK (-9) instead of Sweden (all the Brexit dooming made me forget that the UK is still a bigger economy and I actually buy some Swedish stuff). As for your list - it seems very arbitrary. Sweden is a good proxy for Finland and they share the same exact trend. Israel is the only other OECD country on your list. The rest are simply random non-OECD countries. Since you and others have brought up immigration I felt the need to review this thesis. For the OECD plotting foreign born population against Pisa math changes gets a decent correlation (Spearman r = −0.384; p = 0.017). Obviously foreign born is an imperfect proxy for classroom demographics, but it's a start. Definitely a trend, not a huge one, but hard to ignore. I'm honestly surprised that it is not discussed much in a 400 page report with correlation plots between composite indices (a sign of a very extensive data analytics project). Total failure on the part of the researchers). Putting aside any racial claims, I would leave open the possibility that training a large percentage of kids in a language they don't really understand is not likely be be as effective as speaking a language that they do understand. Seems pretty obvious actually. In fact if you drop the English speaking countries from the OECD list (English is very commonly spoken across the globe), then the correlation coefficient goes up to −0.55; p = 0.001).

by blululu 24d ago

bsoqk 24d ago

[flagged]

rayiner 24d ago
Yeah, it's useless to look at time-series changes in this data without accounting for the fact that, e.g., 29% of students in Germany now have a migration background. A huge chunk of German students are growing up with parents who don't speak German at home, of course that's going to cause test scores to decline.
- jimaway123 24d ago
  [flagged]
- my-next-account 24d ago
  Swedish scores sank for both Swedish and maths in "natives", 2nd gen and 3rd gen immigrants. Scores did not sink in Swedish for 1st gen immigrants. In other words: Everyone is getting worse, but some were already worse than others before.

cufjufxtx 24d ago

[flagged]

amadeoeoeo 24d ago

I see news and forums claiming the problem is screens/smartphones and social media. Given the big gap between the east and the west... does anybody know if these are somehow less used/abused in asian countries? Any other reason why this gap might happen? Thanks

nixon_why69 24d ago
Living in one Asian country, phone scrolling still happens with adults but kids get a lot of homework and definitely do it. Honestly excessive amounts, quantity over quality but at least studying is happening. If some third type of country didn't do doomscrolling but ignored their homework to play outside, that's better than scrolling but it's still not homework.
- samudrijan 23d ago
  At what age does the homework kick in for kids growing up in Asia?
  - nixon_why69 23d ago
    Speaking for China specifically, and this is all word of mouth since my kids are at a posh international school (apply hate appriopriately): Elementary school is 8-5, longish day but not too bad on homework. Middle school (grades 6-9) there's been a recent drive to have less homework so they stay till only 7:00 (!) doing it at school and only a little take home done between dinner and bed. High school is your life revolves around homework, everyone realizes it's counterproductive to learning but they're all stuck in this trap grinding for the big exams that will shape the rest of your life. Key word neijuan. Actual Chinese (and other asian countries) can chime in where I'm mistaken.
Tade0 24d ago
Here's a data point that should help: Poland's math score dropped by just 5 points. As for other tests: Science: -4 Reading: -7. Much like with GDP per capita, my country is climbing the rankings, but only via walkover.

meindnoch 24d ago

[flagged]

MrBuddyCasino 24d ago

[flagged]

BeetleB 24d ago
Would love to see a more detailed breakdown. In the US, often the highest performers are children of immigrants.
- rayiner 24d ago
  There is a big difference between different immigrant groups. In the U.S., children of immigrants are also often the lowest performers. The U.S. tracks test scores by race and not immigration status. But looking at test scores for hispanic students is a rough proxy because more than 60% of hispanic students are immigrants or the children of immigrants: https://www.equityinhighered.org/indicators/secondary-school-completion/naep-12th-grade-achievement-levels https://www.equityinhighered.org/indicators/secondary-school.... That means they probably grew up in a household where their parents weren’t native english speakers.
  - BeetleB 24d ago
    > There is a big difference between different immigrant groups. In the U.S., children of immigrants are also often the lowest performers. My comment did not preclude either of these from being true. I didn't say "On average, children of immigrants do better in the US." I said "often the highest performers are children of immigrants." > But looking at test scores for hispanic students is a rough proxy because more than 60% of hispanic students are immigrants or the children of immigrants: Looking at the test scores for Asians is also a rough proxy of children of immigrants, and you can see what your link shows: They are the lowest of all groups in being "below average", and the highest of all groups in the top category ("Advanced") - over double the next highest race in math, for example. I expected better reasoning from you, given the whole "Asian and child of immigrants" ;-) (As an aside, not sure how relevant your link is, given that it's from 2015, and the thread is about the shift from 2015 to now).

RGamma 24d ago

Sure you can torture your children with ever harsher "education", almost none of which matters in non-research positions. Then don't be surprised when they run out.

JumpCrisscross 24d ago
> you can torture your children with ever harsher "education" Harsh educations don’t work. Neither does modern coddling, prevalent in the West. If any adversity prompts a mental health crisis, you’re at a global disadvantage. Economically and, I’d argue, in terms of quality of life.
- Huarache1 24d ago
  The issue is that Mental Health is genuinely a fleeting, seemingly slowly renewable resource brought down by either screens, stress, or something else. I believe that openly talking about it, while a great way to de-stigmatize it, may have inadvertently caused self-diagnoses and worsening symptoms to increase. There is also something else to be said about Mental Health, coming from one of the countries with the lowest rates of someone taking their own lives, and its not just due to underreporting. Peru probably isn't the best place to live, but the food, weather, people, and general culture which almost normalizes suffering in an almost Buddhist way (Sufre Peruano sufre! lit. Suffer Peruvian, Suffer!) might have something to do with a more robust mental health situation?
  - JumpCrisscross 24d ago
    > Mental Health is genuinely a fleeting, seemingly slowly renewable resource Is there a credible source for “mental health” being an extinguishable quantity? This sounds an awful lot like the battery hypothesis of longevity.
  - cindyllm 23d ago
    [dead]
  - Daishiman 23d ago

polski-g 24d ago

As they say, demographics is destiny.

Haven880 24d ago

Those top scorer countries just soooooo happen to have world lowest birthrate. Maybe it has to do with extraordinary pressure to succeed at all cost since one is baby?

bayindirh 24d ago
I don't think so. While I believe more in the student than the school for success, in the formative years, a good foundation is necessary, as somebody can't know better if they don't know anything. So, a good education system's effects are compounded for younger children w.r.t. higher education. So, these education systems need a check and tune-up to adapt them to current age and perform at their peak again.
HSO 24d ago
maybe check out ``western`` birth rates without immigration before spouting next time

justacrow 23d ago

While the examples above just draws trolls pushing an immigration angle, consider these other countries: Finland -45 Bulgaria -38 Malaysia -62 Israel -33 Serbia -44 Indonesia: -24 Full data is on Table 2.9, page 101 in the report: https://www.oecd.org/en/publications/pisa-2025-results-volume-i_73451bc5-en.html https://www.oecd.org/en/publications/pisa-2025-results-volum...

blululu 23d ago
You know I pulled these figures out of their table on the bus in to work. I selected the largest economies in the OECD (Germany, France, America, South Korean and Japan are the largest economies in the OECD). I added Taiwan and Singapore for context since my contention related to east Asia and only two countries is unbalanced. I should have added UK (-9) instead of Sweden (all the Brexit dooming made me forget that the UK is still a bigger economy and I actually buy some Swedish stuff). As for your list - it seems very arbitrary. Sweden is a good proxy for Finland and they share the same exact trend. Israel is the only other OECD country on your list. The rest are simply random non-OECD countries. Since you and others have brought up immigration I felt the need to review this thesis. For the OECD plotting foreign born population against Pisa math changes gets a decent correlation (Spearman r = −0.384; p = 0.017). Obviously foreign born is an imperfect proxy for classroom demographics, but it's a start. Definitely a trend, not a huge one, but hard to ignore. I'm honestly surprised that it is not discussed much in a 400 page report with correlation plots between composite indices (a sign of a very extensive data analytics project). Total failure on the part of the researchers). Putting aside any racial claims, I would leave open the possibility that training a large percentage of kids in a language they don't really understand is not likely be be as effective as speaking a language that they do understand. Seems pretty obvious actually. In fact if you drop the English speaking countries from the OECD list (English is very commonly spoken across the globe), then the correlation coefficient goes up to −0.55; p = 0.001).