Gender and Cognitive Skills Throughout Childhood Dissertation
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Gender and Cognitive Skills throughout Childhood Dissertation Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University By Benjamin Guild Gibbs, M.S. Graduate Program in Sociology The Ohio State University 2009 Dissertation Committee: Douglas Downey, Advisor Rachel Dwyer Vincent Roscigno Copyright by Benjamin Guild Gibbs 2009 Abstract When do gender gaps in math and reading skills emerge and why? I examine gender gaps in math and reading from 9 months to 4 years of age with the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study—Birth Cohort and from kindergarten to 5th grade with the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study—Kindergarten Cohort. With standardized assessments of cognitive skills, I find that girls excel in early math and reading skills in early childhood, before kindergarten begins. Although girls’ advantages in reading continue, math advantages appear to reverse upon school entry. I show with item-level assessments that this “reversal of fortunes” pattern is misleading. Girls maintain math advantages in counting, identifying numbers, and shape recognition across childhood. Boys’ advantages emerge with the onset of multiplication, division, place values, rate and measurement, and fractions. I find that gender gaps in reading can be largely explained by gender differences in classroom citizenship. For math, gender differences in parental expectations and investments are largely the result of feedback effects rather than parents’ gender-stereotypic behavior. ii Dedication To my girls, Abbey and Amelia. iii Acknowledgments This work represents nearly a three year effort with support and guidance from many individuals and institutions. My advisor, Doug Downey, provided constant encouragement throughout the many iterations of this project. Without his direction, constructive skepticism, and continued interest, this project would not have come to fruition. An early collaborator, Anne McDaniel, was instrumental in shaping the initial questions developed in this dissertation. Claudia Buchmann gave of her time on early drafts and provided direction during the critical first stages of the project. Andrew Penner gave generously of his time to read a portion of this work that lead to questions that quickly pushed this project further and sparked news lines or inquiry to explore. Finally, anonymous reviewers of a portion of this work detailed how research seeking to reconcile two competing literatures might be framed. I also benefited from the support of faculty and fellow graduate students who gave feedback in several forums on campus, including presentations in the Early Childhood working group, the Hayes Research Forum, and a conference hosted by the Initiative in Population Research. Research at this scale required extensive support from friends and family. Marcia Gibbs, copy edited the manuscript several times during the final stages of this project iv with narrow time constraints. Kevin Shafer was an instrumental friend and colleague in the process who gave continued interest and encouragement throughout the projects development, as did Jamie Lynch, Deniz Yucel and many others. The burden of time and energy disproportionately placed in dissertation work was gracefully shouldered by my wife, who kept two small girls busy while giving unwavering support throughout the entirety of this process. She gently showed me how to balance family, work, and community obligations. Finally, this research was supported by a grant from the American Educational Research Association which receives funds for its “AERA Grants Program” from the National Science Foundation and the National Center for Education Statistics of the Institute of Educational Sciences (U.S. Department of Education) under the NSF Grant #DRL-0634035. Opinions reflect those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the granting agencies. v Vita May 2, 1977 ......................................................................Born – Laconia, New Hampshire 2003..................................................................B.S. Sociology, Brigham Young University 2005.................................................................M.S. Sociology, Brigham Young University 2008 to present.................................... AERA Doctoral Fellow, The Ohio State University Publications Bahr, S., Armstrong, A., Gibbs, B., Harris, P., Fisher., J., 2005. The reentry process: how parolees adjust to release from prison. Fathering 3, 243–265. Fields of Study Major Field: Sociology vi Table of Contents Abstract............................................................................................................................... ii Dedication.......................................................................................................................... iii Acknowledgements............................................................................................................ iv Vita..................................................................................................................................... vi List of Tables .................................................................................................................... vii List of Figures......................................................................................................................x Chapter 1: Introduction.......................................................................................................1 Chapter 2: Literature Review..............................................................................................9 Chapter 3: Methods...........................................................................................................42 Chapter 4: Results.............................................................................................................64 Chapter 5: Conclusion and Discussion .............................................................................97 References........................................................................................................................109 Appendix: Supplemental Material ...................................................................................125 vii List of Tables Table 1: Descriptive Statistics including Comparisons of Female and Male Mean Differences, ECLS-B .........................................................................................................71 Table 2: Descriptive Statistics including Comparisons of Female and Male Mean Differences, ECLS-K.........................................................................................................73 Table 3: Descriptive Statistics of Cognitive Skills including Comparisons of Female and Male Mean Differences, ECLS-B......................................................................................77 Table 4: Descriptive Statistics of Cognitive Skills including Comparisons of Female and Male Mean Differences, ECLS-K......................................................................................77 Table 5: Structural Equation Model of Bayley Scores at 9 months by Gender, Controlling for Various Factors in the Model.......................................................................................90 Table 6: Structural Equation Model of Bayley Scores at 2 years by Gender, Controlling for Various Factors in the Model.......................................................................................91 Table 7: Structural Equation Model of Early Math Skills by Gender at 4 Years of Age, Controlling for Various Factors in the Model....................................................................92 viii Table 8: Structural Equation Model of Early Reading Skills by Gender at 4 Years of Age, Controlling for Various Factors in the Model....................................................................93 Table 9: Structural Equation Model of 5th Grade Math Skills by Gender, Controlling for Various Factors in the Model.............................................................................................94 Table 10: Structural Equation Model of 5th Grade Reading Skills by Gender, Controlling for Various Factors in the Model.......................................................................................96 Table 11: Descriptives including gender comparisons, Kindergarten-Fall .....................128 Table 12: Descriptives including gender comparisons, Kindergarten-Spring.................129 Table 13: Descriptives including gender comparisons, 1st Grade-Fall............................130 Table 14: Descriptives including gender comparisons, 1st Grade-Spring........................131 Table 15: Descriptives including gender comparisons, 3rd Grade-Spring .......................132 Table 16: Descriptives including gender comparisons, 5th Grade-Spring .......................134 Table 17: Subtest Level of Proficiency with Descriptions ..............................................135 ix List of Figures Figure 1: Conceptual Model of Gender-Role Socialization ..............................................25 Figure 2: Autoregressive Latent Trajectory Model of Gender Differences in Cognitive Skill....................................................................................................................................62 Figure 3: Cohen's d Calculation.........................................................................................62 Figure 4: Growth Curve (ALT) of Standardized Math Scores