Exploring the role of social reasoning and self-efficacy in the mathematics problem-solving performance of low- and middle-SES children

This research rejects the "deficit model" of low-income children's cognition and educational experiences and, instead, promotes a "strengths-based" view. Specifically, this research sought to capitalize on low-SES children's strength in social reasoning. Such social-cognitive strength is rooted in the unique socialization experiences of low-income children and has been revealed in recent studies of "theory of mind" development.;The purpose 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 low- versus middle-SES children. To this aim, 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, strategy use, and self-efficacy; and (3) the relation between children's mathematics performance and mathematics self-efficacy, were explored.;Participants were 66 low-SES and 98 middle-SES fifth graders. Measures included a mathematics problem-solving test, a mathematics self-efficacy measure, a demographic information sheet, and mathematics and reading standardized test scores. Four problem formats (two social, two abstract) were represented on the mathematics problem-solving and self-efficacy measures. The two social formats were "everyday activity" word problems and "social cognitive" word problems. The two abstract formats were "traditional textbook" (decontextualized) word problems and symbolic equations.;All children performed better on symbolic equations than on any of the three word problem formats. The low-SES group performed significantly better on the social-cognitive word problems than on the traditional textbook (abstract) word problems. This provides evidence that the social-cognitive capital that low-SES children possess can be harnessed in the domain of mathematics problem-solving to promote learning. Word problem variations did not have an effect for the middle-SES group.;Participants gave higher self-efficacy ratings to the symbolic equations than to the two social word problems. Low-SES children reported higher self-efficacy for traditional textbook than for social-cognitive word problems. Middle-SES children reported equivalent self-efficacy ratings across the three word problem types. Overall, mathematics self-efficacy was shown to predict mathematics performance.