I**A
发帖数: 2345 | | q********y
发帖数: 615 | | i**e
发帖数: 19242 | 3 How much do the decisions of parents matter? Most parents believe that even
the most mundane acts of parenting—from their choice of day care to their
policy on videogames—can profoundly influence the success of their children
. Kids are like wet clay, in this view, and we are the sculptors.
As wealth increases, adults play a much smaller role in determining the
mental ability of their children.
.Yet in tests measuring many traits, from intelligence to self-control, the
power of the home environment pales in comparison to the power of genes and
peer groups. We may think we're sculptors, but the clay is mostly set.
A new paper suggests that both metaphors can be true. Which one is relevant
depends, it turns out, on the economic status of families.
For a paper in Psychological Science, researchers at the University of Texas
at Austin and the University of Virginia looked at 750 pairs of American
twins who were given a test of mental ability at the age of 10 months and
then again at the age of 2. By studying the performance of identical versus
fraternal twins, the scientists could tease out the relative importance of
factors such as genetics and the home environment. Because the infants came
from households across the socioeconomic spectrum, it also was possible to
see how wealth influenced test scores.
When it came to the mental ability of 10-month-olds, the home environment
was the key variable, across every socioeconomic class. But results for the
2-year-olds were dramatically different. In children from poorer households,
the choices of parents still mattered. In fact, the researchers estimated
that the home environment accounted for approximately 80% of the individual
variance in mental ability among poor 2-year-olds. The effect of genetics
was negligible.
The opposite pattern appeared in 2-year-olds from wealthy households. For
these kids, genetics primarily determined performance, accounting for nearly
50% of all variation in mental ability. (The scientists made this
conclusion based on the fact that identical twins performed much more
similarly than fraternal twins.) The home environment was a distant second.
For parents, the correlation appears to be clear: As wealth increases, the
choices of adults play a much smaller role in determining the mental ability
of their children.
Children from wealthy households get all the advantages that money can buy,
from music lessons to SAT tutors. Although parents might fret over the
details of such advantages—is it better to play the piano or the violin?—
these details are mostly insignificant, subject to the law of diminishing
returns. As the science blogger Razib Kahn notes, "When you remove the
environmental variance, the genetic variance remains."
These results capture the stunning developmental inequalities that set in
almost immediately, so that even the mental ability of 2-year-olds can be
profoundly affected by the socio-economic status of their parents. As a
result, their genetic potential is held back.
Though this latest study doesn't speculate about the causes of these class
differences, previous research has focused on a panoply of factors, such as
the variety of words directed toward the child (more variety leads to higher
test scores), the number of books in the home and even the ratio of
encouraging remarks to discouraging warnings. By the age of 3, children from
wealthier households hear, on average, about 500,000 encouragements and 80,
000 discouragements. The ratio is reversed in households on welfare.
Such statistics have led many researchers to highlight the importance of
improving the early-childhood environments of poor children. Economists such
as James Heckman, a Nobel laureate at the University of Chicago, have long
advocated for increased investments in preschool education, but this latest
study suggests that interventions need to begin even earlier. One possible
model is the "Baby College" administered by the Harlem Children's Zone,
which seeks to equip brand-new parents with better parenting skills.
Eliminating such inequalities in the early years of life would simply create
a new kind of inequality, driven by genetics. But such a world would at
least let more children come closer to their mental potential, unconstrained
by the mistakes or impoverishment of their parents. The greatest luxury we
can give our children, it turns out, is the luxury of being the type of
parent that doesn't matter at all. | i**e
发帖数: 19242 | 4 LLD,俺愣是没太看懂，谁看懂了，给咱总结归纳一下？谢！
//再者，这个研究最大只整到了3岁，就感发话，parentign无关紧要了？ | R******a
发帖数: 1096 | 5 灌水嘛，越多漏洞能让大家多方位跳坑越好。：）
【在 i**e 的大作中提到】
: LLD,俺愣是没太看懂，谁看懂了，给咱总结归纳一下？谢！
: //再者，这个研究最大只整到了3岁，就感发话，parentign无关紧要了？
| l*******e
发帖数: 3566 | 6 其实这个文章难道不是说的rich parents do matter？
以前我就看过Paper，是关于语言的，upper class的父母对孩子讲话比较多，还有
interaction的质量比较高，所以这些孩子的语言发展比较快之类的。
这篇讲的是，如果能够提高3岁不利环境中的孩子的环境，那么，也许我们可以说rich
parents don't matter。
事实上，parenting是长期的事，不会无关紧要滴。。。
【在 i**e 的大作中提到】
: LLD,俺愣是没太看懂，谁看懂了，给咱总结归纳一下？谢！
: //再者，这个研究最大只整到了3岁，就感发话，parentign无关紧要了？
| F*******t
发帖数: 1283 | 7 这个mental ability说的是智商吧，parenting 应该还是可以改变table manner 的，
智商大概推不动了。
【在 i**e 的大作中提到】
: LLD,俺愣是没太看懂，谁看懂了，给咱总结归纳一下？谢！
: //再者，这个研究最大只整到了3岁，就感发话，parentign无关紧要了？
| b******r
发帖数: 3206 | 8 没有看论文原文。貌似结论应该是：在经济有限的情况下，家长仔细选择衡量给子女提
供哪些条件很大程度上会影响到孩子的发展；在经济条件无限的情况下，孩子可以得到
所有可能的物质条件，决定发展的因素就主要是基因了——乍一看，废话吗不是？再一
想，WSJ最近走火入魔了。 | s*****r
发帖数: 1032 | 9 这让我想起了我的一个好朋友去年和我说的话。他说他研究了孩子将来的成就和
socioeconomic status的correlation，发现只要有钱，推与不推区别不大。那时他刚
从牛校MBA毕业。这个理论对我来说没有意义啦。 |
|
