The Role of Teachers’ Beliefs and Language on Pre-kindergarten Children’s Beliefs About Who Can Succeed in Science

• In Event: Who Knows What? Influences on and Consequences of Beliefs about Competence in Children

Abstract

Stereotypes about science develop early, are widespread, and lead to the underrepresentation of women and some minority groups (Miller et al., 2018; Nosek et al., 2009; Wigfield et al., 2015). Such stereotypes build on the idea that only certain types of people can succeed in science. We examined the development of children’s exclusivity beliefs (i.e., beliefs that science is only for a few people) and how these beliefs affect children’s own engagement in science. In addition to documenting the developmental trajectory of these beliefs, we also examined how pre-kindergarten teachers’ own beliefs about science and the language they use when teaching science shape these trajectories over time.

We recruited 92 children (Mage = 5.07 years; 40 female; 17.4% Hispanic, 15.2% Asian, 44.6% White, 4.3% African American, 18.5% other/unknown) from eight public pre-kindergarten classrooms in New York City. Children participated in two study sessions (spaced three months apart). During each session, to measure their science exclusivity beliefs, children rated how many people they associated with science (e.g., whether science is for “only one person” (scored 1), “only a few people” (2), “some people” (3), “a lot of people” (4)). To assess their science engagement, children rated how much they were interested in science (1 = Not, 2 = A little, 3 = Sort of, 4 = Really) and whether they would like to read a science book or an art book. Teachers of the participating children completed measures of their essentialist beliefs and explicit gender stereotypes about science. In addition, in between the two child sessions, teachers audio-recorded themselves teaching one science lesson, which we coded for the prevalence of action- (e.g., “do science”) and identity-based (e.g., “be scientists”) descriptions of science.

Teachers who endorsed more essentialist beliefs about science (β = .41, SE = .14, p = .006) and more gender stereotypes (β = .56, SE = .18, p = .003) had students with more exclusive beliefs about science (see Figure 1). Furthermore, teachers’ science essentialism (β = .64, SE = .19, p < .001) and gender stereotypes (β = 1.34, SE = .25, p < .001) predicted the development of increasingly more exclusive beliefs about science in children over time. Children with more exclusive beliefs about science also indicated less interest in science themselves (β = .21, SE = .07, p = .003). Regarding teacher language, greater use of identity-based language reduced the likelihood that children would choose the science book cross-sectionally (β = -.39, SE = .13, p = .004; see Figure 2), and also decreased likelihood of choosing the science book over time (β = -.19, SE = .08, p = .016).

Together, these findings indicate that teachers’ beliefs about science relate to children’s beliefs about who can engage in science, which in turn shape children’s own interest in science. Further, together with experimental work in this area (Rhodes et al., 2019; 2020), these findings indicate subtle features of teacher language as one possible mechanism shaping the development of children’s science beliefs and behavior over time.

Authors

• Michelle Wang, New York University
  Presenting Author

• Amanda Cardarelli, New York University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Marjorie Rhodes, New York University
  Non-Presenting Author