Policy debates in education are often framed by using international test scores, such as the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). The obvious presumption is that observed differences in test scores within and across countries reflect differences in cognitive skills and general...

The goal of this paper is to analyze the role that non-cognitive skills and, in particular, regional differences in those skills, play on the observed differences in 15-year-old student's academic performance, across Spanish regions, on PISA 2009. Previous research has shown the relevance of...