The Development of Linquistic Attitudes and Preferences

Abstract

This paper reports the findings of a study on the preferences and attitudes held by 87 kindergarten and first grade children toward Hawaii Creole English (HCE) and standard English (SE). The subjects were students at two elementary schools in urban Honolulu, one located in one of the least desirable, industrial areas of the city, the other in a more residential neighborhood, inhabited by members of a professional class. The children in the latter school preferred English, as did the first graders in the former. However, the younger children in the lower socio-economic school expressed a preference for, and had positive attitudes toward, HCE. These findings indicate that a switch by speakers of Hawaii Creole English in linguistic preferences and attitudes occurs in the first two grades of school. Tests of fluency in both languages revealed that the children from the higher socio-economic school were more competent in SE than the other children. However, with the exception of the younger children in the lower socio-economic school, all the subjects displayed approximately equal fluency in HCE.