Stanford study indicates link between social behavior and academic success

February 16, 2006

By Angela Hokanson, Bay City News Service

STANFORD (BCN) - A study by researchers from the Stanford University School of Education published in the January/February issue of "Child Development" points toward a link between literacy and social behavior among low-income children, the university reported Wednesday.

The study, which is titled "Contemporaneous and Longitudinal Associations Between Social Behavior and Literacy Achievement in a Sample of Low-Income Elementary School Children," indicates a correlation between poor literacy skills and aggressive behavior, and also between good literacy skills and good social skills for children in certain grade levels.

The study followed a sample of low-income children in kindergarten through fifth grades on the West Coast.

The study found that children who had low literacy levels in first grade tended to demonstrate aggressive behavior in third grade, and that children who had low literacy levels in third grade generally had aggressive tendencies in the fifth grade.

Conversely, children who had high social skills in first grade and kindergarten had higher literacy levels up until the third grade.

The correlation between positive social skills and literacy ended by the fifth grade, a trend that the study's authors were not able to explain.

The study supports the idea that children's academic and social development is closely linked, according to the study's authors.

"Children's social behavior can promote or undermine their learning, and their academic performance may have implications for their social behavior," said Sarah Miles, a co author of the study and a doctoral student in the School of Education.

The study also underscores the importance of paying attention to children's social development in preschool and in the early grades of elementary school even when academic achievement is the main goal, the study's authors conclude.

The data utilized in the study includes teachers' assessments of their students' social behaviors, and data from standardized literacy tests.

The study was co-authored by Deborah Stipek, dean of the Stanford University School of Education.

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