Mother Behavior in an Unstructured Situation and Child's Acquisition of Number Conservation

HATANO, G Cyoo; MiYAKE, KAzuo; and TAJIMA, NOBUMOTO. Mother Behavior in an Unstructured Situation and Child's Acquisition of Number Conservation. CHILD DEVELOPMENT, 1980, 51, 379-385. 54 mother-and-4-year-old-child pairs were each given 2 sets of constructive toys and left free to interact for 10 min. They were surreptitiously videotaped. Mother behavior ratings yielded directiveness and warm concern scores through factor analysis. 2 years later, the child was given a test of number conservation and a Binet-type IQ test. As hypothesized from Piaget's theory of development, the mother's directiveness was a powerful negative predictor (r = -.41) of the number of correct responses on the conservation test and, when combined with the breadwinner's occupational status, explained 27% of the variance. Neither the mother's warm concern nor the child's score on PPVT at age 4 contributed significantly to the prediction of conservation. However, when IQ was used as a criterion, warm concern was correlated significantly (+.34) and was the third most powerful predictor, following occupation and PPVT, but directiveness showed negligible correlation. The use of multiple criteria in cognitive socialization studies was recommended.