Elsevier

Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology

Volume 35, Issue 5, September–October 2014, Pages 422-432
Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology

Does higher peer socio-economic status predict children's language and executive function skills gains in prekindergarten?

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.appdev.2014.07.001Get rights and content

Highlights

  • We examined effects of peers on children's gains in public prekindergarten.

  • Peer SES was associated with gains in children's language and executive function skills.

  • There was some evidence of threshold effects.

  • Findings are discussed in the context of proposals to increase preschool access.

Abstract

Because most public preschool programs are means tested, children enrolled in these programs accordingly have peers from predominantly low-income families who present lower cognitive skills and more behavioral problems, on average. The present study examined the role of having a higher percentage of peers from higher-SES families on gains in children's receptive vocabulary and executive function skills at the end of prekindergarten. Participants included 417 children attending a prekindergarten program that is not means tested. Findings indicated that having a higher percentage of peers from higher-SES families showed small, positive associations with greater gains in end-of-prekindergarten receptive vocabulary and executive function skills. Results are discussed in the context of current proposals to increase access to publicly funded preschool for higher-income families.

Section snippets

Theory and empirical evidence: Peer effects in preschool

An important theoretical and conceptual question in exploring peer effects in preschool is what constitutes an ideal or optimal set of peers. Several prominent theories provide different answers to this question (Yudron, Jones, & Raver, in press). For example, Piaget argued that children learn best in same-age peer groups because they need to master the skills at one level of development before advancing to the next (Piaget, 1983). Vygotsky's theory of proximal development conversely advanced

Participants and setting

All sample children were enrolled in the Boston Public School prekindergarten program in 2009–2010. The program was open to any four-year-old in the city; there were no income requirements as there are in most prekindergarten programs (Barnett et al., 2010). Children in the program received a full day (6.5 h) of preschool. Class size was capped at 22, and classrooms were staffed by a teacher and a paraprofessional, for a maximum teacher–student ratio of 1:11. All BPS prekindergarten teachers

Descriptive statistics: Peer question predictors

On average, children were in classrooms where 32% of their peers were not eligible for free-reduced lunch (range of 0–95%; SD = 22; see Table 1). As expected and as shown in Table 2, children who had more peers ineligible for free-reduced lunch (peer SES) had peers with higher cognitive skills, on average. Having a higher percentage of peers from higher-SES families and peer PPVT scores were positively and moderately correlated (r = 0.65; p < .0001). There was a slightly weaker correlation between

Discussion

Consistent with concerns regarding the effects of limiting enrollment in public preschool programs to low-income families, we found that having a higher percentage of peers from higher-income families was positively associated with gains in children's spring receptive vocabulary skills, controlling for children's fall receptive vocabulary scores and child background, other peer, classroom, teacher, and school characteristics. Spline regression results indicated that the positive association

Acknowledgments

Authors' note: Christina Weiland's work on this paper was funded by the Institute of Education Sciences and by the Boston Public Schools. Hirokazu Yoshikawa's work on this paper was funded by the Institute of Education Sciences. Thanks is given to participating families, teachers, principals, district staff (particularly Jason Sachs and the BPS early childhood coaches), Carolyn Layzer and Abt Associates, and the Wellesley Centers for Women. Also a special thanks to Kchersti Ulvestad for

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