The COVID-19 Pandemic in the School Year 2020/2021: How Did Children's Basic Cognitive Abilities Develop? (Poster 18)

• In Event: AERA Poster Session Fifteen
  In Poster Session: Novel Evidence on School Effectiveness and School Improvement

Abstract

In current empirical educational research, one important question is how the societal measures taken to contain the COVID-19 pandemic affected students’ cognitive development and whether disadvantaged students suffered particular disadvantages in their cognitive development depending on their individual characteristics or family background. Based on an Austrian sample elementary school students (n=104), we assessed students’ basic cognitive abilities in the 2020/21 school year before and after measures to contain the second and third pandemic waves in Austria (e.g., contact restrictions, school closures, distance learning). The findings indicate that, on average, children did not develop as positively over the nine-months study period characterized by pandemic containment measures as would have been expected. Beyond this, our results indicate cognitive losses among disadvantaged groups.

Authors

• Wolfram Rollett, University of Education Freiburg
  Presenting Author

• Thomas Leitgeb
  Non-Presenting Author

• Katja Scharenberg, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München
  Presenting Author