What Would Happen If?: A Comparison of Father and Mother Questions to Children at the Museum

• In Event: 3-220 - The Darndest Questions: The Role of Questioning in Children’s Learning

Integrative Statement

Parent-child conversation scaffolds children’s understanding of scientific concepts that cannot be learned through firsthand experience (e.g., electricity, germs; Haden, 2014). Traditionally, this literature has focused on mother-child conversations, given mothers’ historical role as children’s primary caregiver. However, current demographic data in the United States indicate fathers play a larger role in childrearing practices than in previous generations (e.g., Cabrera, Volling, & Barr, 2018). Furthermore, fathers are, on average, more challenging communicative partners than mothers. For example, in home-based settings, fathers ask more wh-questions (e.g., How does that work?) that encourage children’s reasoning and causal explanations (Leaper et al., 1998).

To our knowledge, however, no studies have examined whether fathers display this more challenging communicative style outside the home, such as in the museum. This is surprising, as previous research shows that adult wh-questions in the museum increase children’s scientific discussions, learning, and engagement (Benjamin, Haden, and Wilkerson, 2010). Therefore, the present study compares mother-child and father-child conversations about science in a museum setting, focusing in particular on parents’ wh-questions. The second aim was to examine if parent wh-questions relate to children’s talk about scientific concepts, and if so, if this effect is moderated by parent gender.

Forty-nine parents (27 fathers, 22 mothers) and their 4- to 6-year-old children visiting a science museum participated in the study. Dyads were videotaped playing with a balance scale at a researcher exhibit. Videos were transcribed at the level of the utterance and reliability coded (Kappa=.75) for the number of utterances that were (1) parent questions and, (2) child references to scientific concepts. Parent questions were categorized into two types: those that were framed with who, what, when, where, why, or how were coded as wh-questions (e.g., How does that work?), and all remaining questions (e.g., Put it there?) were coded as close-ended questions. Child utterances were coded as scientific if they referenced a scientific fact (e.g., this one is heavier.) or causal process (e.g., When you move this one, the other one moves too.).

Controlling for the amount of time spent at the exhibit, fathers asked significantly more wh-questions than mothers (p< .001), but close-ended questions did not differ by parent gender (p= .96). Further, parents’ wh-questions were positively related to children’s scientific talk, (p= .001), whereas their close-ended questions were negatively related, (p= 0.07) (Figure 1). Critically, parent gender moderated this relation such that fathers’ wh-questions were more strongly related to children’s scientific talk than mothers’ wh-questions (Figure 2). Further analysis indicated that this effect was explained by differences in the content of the question: wh-questions from fathers focused more on scientific content than mothers’ wh-questions, (p= .04).

These results suggest that wh-questions are one mechanism that promotes preschool-aged children’s scientific talk in museums. Importantly, however, this mechanism may operate differently across learning partners. As this is the first study to explicitly examine the types of conversations fathers have with their children in the museum, we will discuss the unique role that fathers can play for children’s learning in informal settings.

Authors

• Kathryn Leech, Harvard University Graduate School of Education
  Presenting Author

• Ian L. Campbell, Boston University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Jenna Alton, Boston University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Kathleen Helen Corriveau, Boston University
  Non-Presenting Author