Sequence of Transitivity, Conservation, and Class Inclusion in an African Culture

Mwamwenda, Tuntufye S.; Mwamwenda, Bernadette B.

doi:10.1177/0022022189204006

Cited by 6 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 23 publications

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“…Amongst the issues that have been considered in related research are, how performance on class inclusion tasks is related to age (e.g., Hodges & French, 1988;McCake, Siegel, Spence & Wilkinson, 1982;Meadows, 1977;Mwamwenda & Mwamwenda, 1989;Winer, Rasnake & Smith, 1987), schooling (e.g., Greene, 1991;Oslon, 1984;Pelligrini, 1982;Pick, 1980;Rogoff, 1981), social class ( Bardouille-Crema, Black & Feldhusen, 1986;Bjorklund & Weiss, 1985;Poole, 1982) and cultural group membership (Boykin, 1982;Burg & Belmont, 1990;Glick, 1975;Luria, 1976;Maccoby & Madiano, 1966;Mwamwenda & Mwamwenda, 1989;Oslon, 1984).…”

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Children's interpretive strategies for class inclusion tasks

Mpofu

1994

Brit J of Edu Psychol

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The study examined children's interpretive strategies for verbally presented class inclusion tasks as related to socio-cultural background, age and level of schooling. A total of 298 black and white Zimbabwe primary school children took part in the study. Children's performance was considered both qualitatively and quantitatively. Significant social class related differences in children's skill orientation were found. However, no socio-culturally related differences in children's use of interpretive strategies obtained, although age and level of schooling accounted for a significant proportion of the variance in performance. Implications for psychoeducational practice as well as suggestions for further research are discussed.Since Piaget's (1963Piaget's ( , 1971) clinical observations associated the ability to classify with the developmental ages of 7 or 8 years, children's class inclusion reasoning has been the subject of a growing body of research. Piaget claimed to have demonstrated that during the concrete operations stage (i.e., 7-1 1 years of age), children developed the ability to classify objects on some inclusion criteria. In the typical Piagetian experiment, a child may, for instance, be shown a set of objects (e.g., buttons) divisible into two or more subsets (e.g., by colour, size or shape) and then asked to relate a subset with a more inclusive one (e.g., How many more buttons are there than round buttons?) If a child was able to make the within class observation that there are more buttons than say round buttons, he/she would have demonstrated classification or class inclusion reasoning. In Piaget's theory of the development of knowledge, the significance of class inclusion reasoning as an indicator of cognitive growth lies in that it has been considered a primary sign of the emergence of logical thinking, that occurs together with the abilities of conservation, seriation and transitivity (Inhelder & Piaget, 1964; Piaget, 1971Piaget, , 1977.Amongst the issues that have been considered in related research are, how performance on class inclusion tasks is related to age (e.

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Children's interpretive strategies for class inclusion tasks

Mpofu

1994

Brit J of Edu Psychol

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“…And cross-cu1tural evidence suggests a universal developmental sequence for other competencies as well. Mwamwenda and Mwamwenda (1989) report several studies which find an invariant sequence: transitive inference, conservation of volume, class inclusion. This data contradicts Piaget's contention that transivity is the most difficult and latest to appear of the three, however the data suggests that a universal sequence among the three may occur.…”

Section: Criticizing Abstraction Which Loses Sight Of Its Constituentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Vygotsky’s Sociohistorical Psychology and its Contemporary Applications

Ratner

1991

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A Continuation Order Plan is available for this series. A continuation order will bring delivery of each new volume immediately upon publication. Volumes are billed only upon actual shipment. For further information please contact the publisher. All rights reservedNo part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, microfilming, recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the Publisher This book is dedicated to my mother, to whom lowe the better part of my sociohistorical psychology PrefaceThe social character of psychological phenomena has never been easy to comprehend. Despite the fact that an intricate set of social relations forms our most intimate thoughts, feelings, and actions, we believe that psychology originates inside our body, in genes, hormones, the brain, and free will. Perhaps this asocial view stems from the alienated nature of most societies which makes individual activity appear to be estranged from social relations. One might have thought that the emergence of scientific psychology would have disclosed the social character of activity which naive experience had overlooked. Unfortunately, a century and a half of psychological science has failed to comprehend the elusive social character of psychological phenomena. Psychological science has evidently been subjugated by the mystifying ideology of society. This book aims to comprehend the social character of psychological functioning. I argue that psychological functions are quintessentially social in nature and that this social character must be comprehended if psychological knowledge and practice are to advance. The social nature of psychological phenomena consists in the fact that they are constructed by individuals in the process of social interaction, they depend upon properties of social interaction, one of their primary purposes is facilitating social interaction, and they embody the specific character of historically bound social relations.This viewpoint is known as sociohistorical psychology. It was articulated most profoundly and comprehensively by the Russian psychologists Lev Vygotsky and Alexander Luria during ,the 1920s and 1930s. Unfortunately, their work has remained marginal in the Soviet Union and in the West, unable to penetrate into mainstream psychological science. The present book attempts to demonstrate that sociohistorical psyvii viii PREFACE chology is a valid view of psychological phenomena which can redirect psychological science toward fruitful future development.While psychologists occasionally touch on the ~ocial character of psychological phenomena, they fail to fully comprehend it or appreciate its centrality. One reason for this failure is that psychological phenomena are intellectually fractured into separate faculties and components. This fragmentation relegates social character to being one component of one or another faculty. Social character is thereby prevented from being central to all psychologica...

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“…Freund, Baker, & Sonnenschein. 1990;Hodges & French, 1988;McCake, Siegel, Spence, & Wilkinson, 1982;Mwamwenda & Mwamwenda, 1989;Winer, Rasnake, & Smith, 1987), social class (Bardouille-Crema, Black, & Feldhusen, 1986;Bjorklund & Weiss, 1985;Mpofu, 1994;Poole, 1982), cultural group membership (Boykin, 1982;Mwamwenda & Mwamwenda, 1989), sex (Pellegrini, 1982;Poole, 1982). task contextual factors (Donaldson, 1982), and schooling (Oslon, 1984;Pellegrini, 1982;Pick, 1980).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…With regard to the age correlate, for example, studies such as those by Meadows (1977) and McCake et al (1982) have tended to confirm Piaget's observation that children tend to achieve the ability to classify at about age seven. However, a significant majority of studies have produced rather equivocal results, for instance that children's ability to classify is more characteristic of 9-1 1 rather than 7-8 year-olds (John, Dambe, Polhemus, & John, 1988;Mwamwenda & Mwamwenda, 1989;Pellegrini, 1982); is achieved at the younger ages of 2 4 (Freund et al, 1990); or is not significantly related to age (Winer et al, 1987).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Rather mixed research finding; have been reported, with some of the studies (e.g. Carlson, 197i;Mpofu, 1994;Mwamwenda & Mwamwenda, 1989) reporting no significant culturally related differences on performance on class inclusion tasks, whereas others (e.g. Maccoby & Madianno, 1966;Oslon, 1984) found clear qualitative differences in the methods of classification used.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Antecedents of Children's Performance on Class Inclusion Tasks: Some Zimbabwean Evidence

Mpofu

1995

Int J Psychol

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An analysis of covariance hierarchical regression procedure was used to examine children's performance on verbally presented classification tasks in relation to the children's socio‐cultural background, age, level of schooling, and sex. Task perception and motivation were entered as covariates. A total of 296 black and white Zimbabwean children took part in the study. Social class membership, age, level of schooling, and sex explained a significant proportion of the variance in performance on the classification tasks, whereas cultural group membership did not. Implications for multicultural perspectives on children's cognitive development are discussed and suggestions made for further research.

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Sequence of Transitivity, Conservation, and Class Inclusion in an African Culture

Cited by 6 publications

References 23 publications

Children's interpretive strategies for class inclusion tasks

Children's interpretive strategies for class inclusion tasks

Vygotsky’s Sociohistorical Psychology and its Contemporary Applications

Antecedents of Children's Performance on Class Inclusion Tasks: Some Zimbabwean Evidence

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