Mar 29 2009
Educational Reform and Jumping to a Conclusion of Causality
Experiments generate the strongest data. With an experiment you can actively manipulate one variable to determine whether an effect on another variable is . . . caused. Unfortunately, experiments are more difficult to conduct and, particularly in the field of psychology, performing them would violate ethics. (E.g., no psychologist would conduct an experiment to determine if abusive parenting causes depression in children.)
With other types of research, a causal relationship is more difficult to determine. Consider this finding on social skills and later income -
According to a University of Illinois professor who studies the sociology of education, high school sophomores who were rated by their teachers as having good social skills and work habits, and who participated in extracurricular activities in high school, made more money and completed higher levels of education 10 years later than their classmates who had similar standardized test scores but were less socially adroit and participated in fewer extracurricular activities.
Teacher observations and record of participation in extracurricular activities were found to be correlated with future educational achievement and income. Does that mean the one(s) caused the others? Maybe. But we don’t know for sure. Perhaps some other factor both drove the students to behave in a given way at one time, and that same factor (or group of factors) caused a similar behavioral outcome (educational and social excel-lence) 10 years later.
When study author Christy Lleras interprets her finding by saying -
Academic achievement is part of the story, but it’s not the whole story. You’ve got to have the social skills and work habits to back those achievements up.
I tend to agree, but very tentatively. For I am not certain that social skills and work habits can be taught by teachers and parents of high school students. Maybe those traits are largely inborn or acquired earlier in life. I don’t know. And I don’t think Christy really knows either. For her to then advocate for changing how schools educate children, as she goes on record in a science article, is not very scientific.
[O]ur schools are failing students by not providing enough opportunities to develop the skills, habits and knowledge we know employers are going to reward.
Really? It may be so, but I’m skeptical.
