A STUDY OF THE EFFECTS ASSOCIATED WITH SOCIOECONOMIC STATUS ON THE PERFORMANCE OF BLACK CHILDREN ON PIAGETIAN TASKS
Abstract
Two hundred forty Black children, 10 boys and 10 girls at each of 6 grade levels and 2 socioeconomic (SES) levels were administered five measures of Piagetian tasks to determine if differences in SES were associated with differences in cognitive development levels. Children were selected from four schools in Gary, Indiana. Five Piagetian tasks were administered to each child individually by two trained examiners. Time out of class was 15 minutes per child. The first examiner gave the reasoning, seriation, classification and causation tasks. For all tasks the child's answer was recorded verbatim, then the child was asked "Why do you think so?". The answer to this question was written down and later analyzed and scored. A second examiner administered the conservation tasks (according to difficulty level): number, mass, length, area, weight and volume. The child's answers and behavioral patterns during assessment were observed and recorded. All materials used in the tasks had been normed and specific responses had been categorized according to Piagetian levels of cognitive development. Analysis of variance was performed on each of the five dependent variables. On all five variables middle SES children performed better than low SES children. Gender produced very little significant differences in scores. High positive correlations between SES and conservation were found. A multiple regression analysis found SES and grade as the best predictors for all variables. Grade was related to maturational level in cognitive growth. A one-way analysis of variance was used to determine the effect of age on performance. In general, the middle SES group improved with age on all tasks except seriation and classification. The same was true for the low SES group. Discussion centered around a number of issues including the significance of the differences in performance between the middle and low SES groups, and the validity of the conservation tasks as measures of cognitive development stages. The wide gap in the development stages between middle and low SES children was noted and implications for future research were considered.
Degree
Ph.D.
Subject Area
Educational psychology
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