Childhood and Beyond, 1986-1995: Documentation

<b>This study is not yet available for use</b><br /><br />

The purpose of this study is to gain an understanding of the development and socialization of children's self-perceptions, task values, and activity choices. Childhood and Beyond is a large-scale, cross-sequential, longitudinal study of development in four primarily white, lower-middle- to middle-class school districts in Midwestern urban/suburban communities, begun in 1986. The study began with groups of children in kindergarten, first, and third grade. Many issues were studied, including children's achievement self-perceptions in various domains and the roles that parents and teachers play in socializing these beliefs. Parent involvement in their children's education was also explored.
<br /><br />

The original sample included 875 children, their parents, and teachers from 10 schools in 4 school districts in Southeastern Michigan. Seventy-nine percent of the sample agreed to participate in the study, which began in 1987. In Year 1 (1987), parents and teachers provided basic information on the children and the children took a school-administered test of cognitive abilities. In Years 2 to 4 (1988 to 1990), data were collected from children, teachers, parents, and school records. During Year 5 (1994), all children from the original sample were re-contacted and 82% of the original sample participated in another wave of data collection. Data collection has continued through two years post-high school.
<br /><br />

The Murray Research Archive holds numeric file data and selected questionnaire pages with open-ended responses from entire sample.