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Exploring The Role Of Social Reasoning And Self-Efficacy In The Mathematics Problem-Solving Performance Of Lower- And Higher-Income Children, Allison G. Butler

Journal of Educational Research and Practice

Research documents an income-based achievement gap in mathematics, yet children from lower-income backgrounds do not lag behind their more advantaged peers in high-level social reasoning tasks. The purpose here was to investigate whether modifying mathematics word problems to make them more socially based would impact the mathematics performance and/or mathematics self-efficacy of lower- versus higher-income children. Research questions regarding (1) the relative difficulty of symbolic equations versus word problems, (2) the impact of socially modifying word problems on children’s accuracy and self-efficacy, and (3) the relation between children’s mathematics performance and mathematics self-efficacy were explored. Participants were 164 5th graders. …