The Role of Imagery on Concept Acquisition in Lower-SES Children

Abstract

DIXON, DAVID, and SALTZ, ELI. The Role of Imagery in Concept Acquisition in Lower-SES Children. CHILD DEVELOPMENT, 1977, 48, 288-291. The present study examined 2 related issues: (a) Do lower-SES children have a representational deficit such that they have difficulty in concept learning unless the stimulus materials are high in imagery value? (b) Does the nature of the concept to be learned determine the optimal type of stimulus materials? Firstand third-grade lower-SES children learned perceptual and functional concepts with stimuli either high or low in imagery value (line drawings or verbal labels of the referents, respectively). The results showed that there were no differential imagery effects for the acquisition of functional concepts; only when the concepts were perceptual in nature did the trends suggest high-imagery facilitation. This interaction is similar to that found among middle-SES children. Thus the data are not consistent with the position that lower-SES children show a representational deficit in concept-acquisition tasks. For both lowerand middle-SES children, the nature of the concept to be learned determines the optimal type of stimulus materials.