Social Class in Education: Children’s Beliefs About who is Smart, Hardworking, and Praiseworthy

Session Type: Paper Symposium

Abstract

Education is a key area in which social-class disparities are manifested and reinforced. This symposium brings together observational and experimental research from four countries to address a critical question: How do children view and experience social class in school? Paper 1 examines children’s beliefs about socioeconomic disadvantage. By middle childhood, children believe that disadvantaged children are more hardworking than advantaged children. Nevertheless, they believe that disadvantaged children are less likely to attain future success. Extending this finding, Paper 2 shows that children perceive disadvantaged children as more hardworking than intelligent, and advantaged children as more intelligent than hardworking. Additionally, children attribute disadvantaged children’s failure to lack of intelligence (vs. hard work) and advantaged children’s failure to lack of hard work (vs. intelligence). Paper 3 examines children’s beliefs about overcoming internal constraints (i.e., lack of ability) and external constraints (i.e., lack of educational resources) in academic achievement. With age, children increasingly believe that one can overcome these constraints through hard work. In addition, children who positively evaluate those who overcome constraints show more persistence and challenge seeking themselves. Paper 4 finds social-class disparities in educational opportunities starting in preschool: Disadvantaged children are afforded fewer opportunities to engage in whole-class discussions, even when they have equal language ability. Further, their classmates mistake this reduced participation for low ability. Together, these papers show that children hold profound beliefs about social class and its consequences for academic achievement. These beliefs could set the stage for negative intellectual stereotypes about disadvantaged children.

Sub Unit

• Social Cognition

Chairs

• Melis Muradoglu, Stanford University

• Eddie Brummelman, Universiteit van Amsterdam (UvA)

Individual Presentations

• Children’s Beliefs About the Role of Economic (Dis)advantage in Education and Work - Presenting Author: Melis Muradoglu, Stanford University; Andrei Cimpian, New York University

• Hardworking but Not Necessarily Smart: Early-Emerging Stereotypes of Children From Poor Families - Presenting Author: Eddie Brummelman, Universiteit van Amsterdam (UvA); Andrei Cimpian, New York University

• Children’s Beliefs and Evaluations About Overcoming Constraints in Academic Achievement and their Relationship to Persistence - Presenting Author: Xin Alice Zhao, East China Normal University

• Unequal Opportunities From the Start: Socioeconomic Disparities in Classroom Participation in Preschool - Presenting Author: Sébastien Goudeau, University of Poitiers; Frédérique Autin; Camille Sanrey; Nicole Stephens; Hazel Rose Markus, Stanford University; Jean-Claude Croizet; Andrei Cimpian, New York University