Language-in-education, language skills and the intergenerational transmission of language in a bilingual society
研究加泰罗尼亚地区语言教育改革如何提升西班牙语母语者的加泰兰语口语技能，进而增加他们与子女使用加泰兰语的倾向，揭示语言政策的代际溢出效应。
We investigate the causal effect of parents’ linguistic skills on the intergenerational language transmission in a bilingual society. We consider the case of Catalonia, where the two main speech communities, Spanish and Catalan, are of similar sizes, and both languages are official, and exploit the natural experiment generated by a language-in-education reform. We discuss theoretically the main alternative channels through which such policies may affect the language parents speak to their children. Empirically, we find that the reform improved oral skills in Catalan among native Spanish speakers. These greater skills increased the propensity to speak Catalan with the offspring, which highlights the intergenerational spillovers overs of the reform. We also show that the effect is not confounded by spurious trends, potential changes in language identity, and linguistically mixed partnership formation.