Editing SAT (section)

=== Association with educational and societal standings and outcomes ===
<gallery mode="packed" heights="250">
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</gallery>Research from the University of California system published in 2001 analyzing data of their undergraduates between Fall 1996 through Fall 1999, inclusive, found that the SAT II{{efn|Known as the SAT Subject Tests since 2005, discontinued in 2021.|name=SAT-subj|group=}} was the single best predictor of collegiate success in the sense of freshman GPA, followed by high-school GPA, and finally the SAT I. After controlling for family income and parental education, the already low ability of the SAT to measure aptitude and college readiness fell sharply while the more substantial aptitude and college readiness measuring abilities of high school GPA and the SAT II each remained undiminished (and even slightly increased). The University of California system required both the SAT I and the SAT II from applicants to the UC system during the four academic years of the study.<ref name="auto">{{Citation|last1=Geiser|first1=Saul|title=UC and the SAT: Predictive Validity and Differential Impact of the SAT I ad SAT II at the University of California|date=October 29, 2001|url=https://web.stanford.edu/~rag/ed351B/sat_study.pdf|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160305072123/https://web.stanford.edu/~rag/ed351B/sat_study.pdf|publisher=University of California, Office of the President.|access-date=September 30, 2014|archive-date=March 5, 2016|last2=Studley|first2=Roger|url-status=live}}</ref> This analysis is heavily publicized but is contradicted by many studies.<ref name="Kuncel-2010" />

There is evidence that the SAT is correlated with societal and educational outcomes,<ref name="Kaufman-2018" /> including finishing a four-year university program.<ref name="Blandin-2018" /> A 2012 paper from psychologists at the University of Minnesota analyzing multi-institutional data sets suggested that the SAT maintained its ability to predict collegiate performance even after controlling for socioeconomic status (as measured by the combination of parental educational attainment and income) and high-school GPA. This means that SAT scores were not merely a proxy for measuring socioeconomic status, the researchers concluded.<ref name="Sackett-2012" /><ref>{{Cite news|last=Novotney|first=Amy|date=December 2012|title=Psychologists debate the meaning of students' falling SAT scores|work=APA Monitor|url=https://www.apa.org/monitor/2012/12/failing-scores|access-date=February 2, 2021|archive-date=May 17, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210517193006/https://www.apa.org/monitor/2012/12/failing-scores|url-status=live}}</ref> This finding has been replicated and shown to hold across racial or ethnic groups and for both sexes.<ref name="Frey-2019" /> Moreover, the Minnesota researchers found that the socioeconomic status distributions of the student bodies of the schools examined reflected those of their respective applicant pools.<ref name="Sackett-2012" /> Because of what it measures, a person's SAT scores cannot be separated from their socioeconomic background.<ref name="Kaufman-2018" /> However, the correlation between SAT scores and parental income or socioeconomic status [[Correlation does not imply causation|should not be taken to mean causation]]. It could be that high scorers have intelligent parents who work cognitively demanding jobs and as such earn higher salaries.<ref name=PinkerTrouble>{{Cite magazine |last=Pinker |first=Steven |author-link=Steven Pinker |date=September 4, 2014 |title=The Trouble With Harvard |url=https://newrepublic.com/article/119321/harvard-ivy-league-should-judge-students-standardized-tests |magazine=The New Republic |archive-url=https://archive.today/20210526224259/https://newrepublic.com/article/119321/harvard-ivy-league-should-judge-students-standardized-tests |archive-date=May 26, 2021 |access-date=July 9, 2023}}</ref> In addition, the correlation is only significant between biological families, not adoptive ones, suggesting that this might be due to [[Heritability of IQ|genetic heritage]], not economic wealth.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Johnson |first1=Wendy |last2=McGue |first2=Matt |author-link2=Matt McGue |last3=Iacono |first3=William G. |date=November–December 2007 |title=Socioeconomic status and school grades: Placing their association in broader context in a sample of biological and adoptive families |journal=Intelligence |volume=35 |issue=6 |pages=526–541 |doi=10.1016/j.intell.2006.09.006|pmid=19081832 |pmc=2598751 }}</ref><ref name=PinkerTrouble/>

In 2007, [[Rebecca Zwick]] and Jennifer Greif Green observed that a typical analysis did not take into account that heterogeneity of the high schools attended by the students in terms of not just the socioeconomic statuses of the student bodies but also the standards of grading. Zwick and Greif Green proceeded to show that when these were accounted for, the correlation between family socioeconomic status and classroom grades and rank increased whereas that between socioeconomic status and SAT scores fell. They concluded that school grades and SAT scores were similarly associated with family income.<ref name="Zwick-2007">{{Cite journal|last1=Zwick|first1=Rebecca|last2=Greif Green|first2=Jennifer|date=Spring 2007|title=New Perspectives on the Correlation of SAT Scores, High School Grades, and Socioeconomic Factors|journal=Journal of Educational Measurement|publisher=National Council on Measurement in Education|volume=44|issue=1|pages=23–45|doi=10.1111/j.1745-3984.2007.00025.x|jstor=20461841}}</ref>

According to the College Board, in 2019, 56% of the test takers had parents with a university degree, 27% parents with no more than a high-school diploma, and about 9% who did not graduate from high school. (8% did not respond to the question.)<ref name="Hobbs-2019" />