State and Trait Effects on Individual Differences in Children's Mathematical Development

Substantial longitudinal relations between children's early mathematics achievement and their much later mathematics achievement are firmly established. These findings are seemingly at odds with studies showing that early educational interventions have diminishing effects on children's mat...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Psychological science 2014-11, Vol.25 (11), p.2017-2026
Main Authors: Bailey, Drew H., Watts, Tyler W., Littlefield, Andrew K., Geary, David C.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Achievement
Biological and medical sciences
Child
Child Development
Children
Children & youth
Cognitive development
Competency based learning
Developmental psychology
Early intervention
Education
Educational psychology
Female
Follow-Up Studies
Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology
Humans
Individual differences
Individuality
Intelligence
Learning
Longitudinal Studies
Male
Mathematics
Memory, Short-Term
Middle school students
Prior knowledge
Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry
Psychology. Psychophysiology
Pupil and student. Academic achievement and failure
Short term memory
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Summary:Substantial longitudinal relations between children's early mathematics achievement and their much later mathematics achievement are firmly established. These findings are seemingly at odds with studies showing that early educational interventions have diminishing effects on children's mathematics achievement across time. We hypothesized that individual differences in children's later mathematical knowledge are more an indicator of stable, underlying characteristics related to mathematics learning throughout development than of direct effects of early mathematical competency on later mathematical competency. We tested this hypothesis in two longitudinal data sets, by simultaneously modeling effects of latent traits (stable characteristics that influence learning across time) and states (e.g., prior knowledge) on children's mathematics achievement over time. Latent trait effects on children's mathematical development were substantially larger than state effects. Approximately 60% of the variance in trait mathematics achievement was accounted for by commonly used control variables, such as working memory, but residual trait effects remained larger than state effects. Implications for research and practice are discussed.
ISSN:0956-7976
1467-9280
DOI:10.1177/0956797614547539