Collaborative Research: Social Influences of Math Learning

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This proposal was submitted in response to EHR Core Research (ECR) program announcement NSF 19-508. The ECR program of fundamental research in STEM education provides funding in critical research areas that are essential, broad and enduring. EHR seeks proposals that will help synthesize, build and/or expand research foundations in the following focal areas: STEM learning, STEM learning environments, STEM workforce development, and broadening participation in STEM. The ECR program is distinguished by its emphasis on the accumulation of robust evidence to inform efforts to (a) understand, (b) build theory to explain, and (c) suggest interventions (and innovations) to address persistent challenges in STEM interest, education, learning, and participation.The learning of mathematical concepts, such as proportions and negative numbers, is frequently fraught with difficulty because often these concepts do not structurally align with whole number concepts acquired during the preschool years. This proposed work investigates how to promote reasoning about such concepts by capitalizing on recent findings demonstrating young children's relative competence in social domains that recruit similar mathematical knowledge. This proposal aims to identify how the acquisition of difficult mathematical concepts may be readily transferred from informal social contexts in which they may be first encountered (e.g., sharing) to more formal contexts in which children are typically asked to apply them (e.g., formal arithmetic). Through behavioral experiments with over 1000 4-9-year-old children, this work will explore how social contexts may promote math learning. In Series 1, studies investigate how social framing impacts children's learning of two traditionally counter-intuitive concepts: negative numbers and proportions. Series 2 will investigates factors that facilitate transfer of knowledge between math concepts learned in contextualized, informal scenarios such as those encountered in one's daily life (e.g., sharing) to more formal, symbolic-based contexts (e.g., division). Finally, Series 3 will investigate how socio-contextual influences may, in turn, serve to promote or hinder children?s learning. These studies investigate how preferences for competition versus collaboration, and gender stereotypes about academic domains impact children's decisions to opt in and out of learning opportunities affect their math learning. The culmination of this work should paint a broader understanding of social influences on math learning, pointing to new directions for math education practices. This project will provide deeper insight into how social contexts may promote or hinder the learning of counter-intuitive math concepts. The project is supported by the EHR Core Research (ECR) program that emphasizes fundamental research in STEM.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.