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Mental Abilities: Sibling Constellation and Social Class Correlates
Author(s) -
MARJORIBANKS KEVIN,
WALBERG HERBERT J.,
BARGEN MARK
Publication year - 1975
Publication title -
british journal of social and clinical psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.479
H-Index - 92
eISSN - 2044-8260
pISSN - 0007-1293
DOI - 10.1111/j.2044-8260.1975.tb00159.x
Subject(s) - sibling , psychology , developmental psychology , variable (mathematics) , crowding , birth order , regression , regression analysis , structural equation modeling , social psychology , statistics , mathematics , demography , cognitive psychology , population , sociology , mathematical analysis , psychoanalysis
Verbal, number, reasoning and spatial ability scores were obtained for 185 11‐year‐old boys. The relations between the mental abilities, social status characteristics and sibling constellation variables were examined using a series of multiple regression equations. A three‐term equation including father's occupational status, inverse of the number of children in the family, and the product of the two variables parsimoniously accounts for as much significant variance in the data as complex many‐termed equations. Birth order, crowding ratio, their squares and products provide no better prediction beyond that afforded by the three‐term equations. The constellation variable, inverse of sibsize, is strongly associated with higher verbal and number ability scores of boys in families of low socio‐economic status, but the effect is attenuated in families of higher socio‐economic status. The results suggest that birth order may be a superfluous sibling constellation variable in research, but that the inclusion of the variable, inverse of sibsize, may lead to a greater understanding of the relation between social status and mental ability performance.