Cultural capital - a shift in perspective: an analysis of PISA 2009 data for Croatia

Using PISA 2009 data for Croatia, this paper addresses the relationship between socio-economic background, cultural capital and educational attainment. Following Bourdieu, we emphasized the importance of interpreting cultural capital effects as effects of family habitus. The results indicated that the material and the relational dimension of cultural capital had independent effects on science literacy results. Although there was no significant interaction effect between socio-economic status and cultural capital, the analysis suggested both a tendency for social reproduction as well as the possibility for social mobility of students with lower socio-economic status.