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Most parents tell their children that maths and science are important. Fewer can say why a particular topic matters for that particular child. A randomised trial in the United States tested whether helping parents have that conversation would change what teenagers did. It is one of the few experiments that targets parents rather than students, and its results lasted years. Here is the detail.
What question did the study ask?
The research is built on a motivation idea called utility value: students put more effort into a subject when they see it as useful for their own goals. The first report, by Harackiewicz, Rozek, Hulleman and Hyde (2012) in Psychological Science, asked whether materials sent only to parents could raise how many maths and science courses teenagers chose. The follow-up, Rozek, Svoboda, Harackiewicz, Hulleman and Hyde (2017) in PNAS, asked whether the effect showed up in test scores and in STEM choices five years later.
Who was studied, and what did parents get?
According to the 2017 full text on PubMed Central:
181 families in Wisconsin (543 people in all), whose children attended 108 different high schools. The families had been part of a long-running study since the mothers' pregnancies in 1990 and 1991.
Families were randomly assigned: 81 students in the intervention group and 100 in the control group.
Intervention parents received a brochure in 10th grade, a second brochure in January of 11th grade, and access to a website. Control parents received nothing.
The first brochure, "Making Connections: Helping Your Teen Find Value in School", gave everyday examples of maths and science use and advised parents to help teens come up with their own examples. The second added how STEM subjects connect to careers and college majors, and how to handle difficult conversations.
None of the materials went to the students directly. Any effect had to pass through parents.
86% of parents reported remembering and using the materials, and 75% of teenagers confirmed their parents had shared them.
What did it find?
More courses: students in the intervention group took 0.81 more semesters of maths and science in 11th and 12th grade, nearly one semester.
Higher scores: their maths and science ACT scores (a US college entrance test) were about 12 percentile points higher. The effect held after controlling for state test scores taken before the intervention, on which the two groups did not differ.
Five years later: at age 20, there was no direct effect of the brochures on STEM career interest. But the extra school preparation predicted more college STEM courses, stronger STEM career aspirations and higher perceived value of STEM. The indirect effect on choosing a STEM college major was not significant.
The authors note the ACT effect was about half the size of the gap between higher and lower income families in their sample.
What does it not show?
The sample was narrow. 90% of students were White, all from Wisconsin, and families were used to taking part in research, so they may have engaged more with the materials than a typical family would.
The long-term link is indirect. The path from extra courses to later STEM choices is correlational.
US course choices differ from India. American students choose electives in Classes 11 and 12; Indian students choose a stream after Class 10. The trial does not tell us how the effect would translate.
It does not test pressure. The brochures were about relevance, not expectations or marks.
What does it mean for parents in India?
The useful part is the type of conversation, not the brochures. In India, the stream decision after Class 10 is the obvious moment, but the same approach fits any time:
Give specific examples, not slogans. "Physics explains how the brakes on your cycle work" lands better than "Science is important for your future".
Let your teen find the connection. The brochures told parents to help children generate their own links to their interests: cricket statistics, phone batteries, cooking, music apps.
Talk about careers concretely. What does an engineer, doctor, data scientist or architect actually do with maths each day? Our post on talking about STEM careers has more.
Keep relevance separate from pressure. Telling a child why a subject is useful is different from demanding marks in it. See high expectations vs pressure.
If your teen wants to see where a subject leads, Fermi's Courses offer university-level courses from working scientists, which can make the "why does this matter" question concrete.
How to read a study like this
Separate the direct effect from the indirect one. The trial showed directly, through randomisation, that parents' materials raised course-taking and test scores. The claim about careers five years later relies on a statistical path through those school outcomes, which is weaker evidence. Both are worth knowing, but they are not equally strong.
Next step: this week, ask your child to name one thing they use daily that depends on a topic from their current maths or science chapter, and talk it through together.
