Inter-subjectivity and collaborative complexity: Effects of peer interaction and context in head start classrooms
Item
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Title
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Inter-subjectivity and collaborative complexity: Effects of peer interaction and context in head start classrooms
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Identifier
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d_2009_2013:4d3964810d56:10587
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identifier
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10757
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Creator
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Garte, Rebecca R.,
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Contributor
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Anna Stetsenko
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Date
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2010
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Language
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English
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Publisher
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City University of New York.
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Subject
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Developmental psychology
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Abstract
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This study provides an assessment paradigm for examining the quality of children's experiences in preschool. In particular, it focused on peer interactions, as assessed by two measures: peer inter-subjectivity and collaborative complexity. To further understand the relationship between these measures peer interactions were analyzed as nested in activity areas through hierarchical linear modeling. Teacher interactions with the peer group and environmental flexibility of the activity area were also used to explain the relationship between the peer interaction measures.;Results showed that the construct of inter-subjectivity was multi-dimensional for this population and sensitive to the immediate social and material context. Higher levels of peer inter-subjectivity were found to predict longer play interactions and greater collaborative complexity. The HLM models also showed that peer interactions varied as a function of activity area, and that environmental flexibility explained some of these differences. In addition, it was found that teacher interactions moderated the relationship between intersubjectivity and collaborative complexity. In the majority of cases teacher intervention weakened this relationship and had a negative effect on inter-subjectivity levels.;In conclusion these results show the theoretical concept of inter-subjectivity to be a valid and useful measurement construct for assessing preschool peer interactions. In addition, the results show that assessments of early childhood education may want to pay more attention to the micro-contexts of the preschool day in order to capture those aspects most salient for children's development. Given that this study was done with a low income sample, it is interesting to note that many of the same findings regarding middle class preschoolers in terms of peer interactions and play were replicated.;Future research may want to explore different populations of preschoolers to determine whether the same dimensions of inter-subjectivity are found. In addition, it would be useful to see whether the social skills assessed in this study are linked to concurrent or longitudinal outcomes in related domains of development.
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Type
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dissertation
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Source
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2009_2013.csv
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degree
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Ph.D.
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Program
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Psychology
