Differential effects of reinforcement versus non-reinforcement upon the crative thinking of different socioeconomic status of elementary school children
Abstract:
The purpose of this research were to investigate (a) the Effects of Immediate-Reinforcement and Dalayed-Reinforcement on Fluency, Flexibility and Originality of Prathom Suksa 4, 5 and 6 School Children with High and Low Socioecomic Status, and (b) the possible Interactions between Reward Conditions and Grade Levels and between Reward Conditions and Socioeconomic Status. The subjects were 180 school children in Bangkok from Samsaen Kindergarden School, Piboon Upatham School and Watmaichonglom School in the academic year 1979. The Prathom Suksa 4, 5 and 6 school children with high and low socioeconomic status were equally divided into three experimental group namely, immediate-reward condition, delayed-reward condition, and no-reward condition. Each group consisted of 30 boys and 30 girls. The research instruments were creative thinking tests, socioeconomic status questionnaire and reward-choiced questionnaire. The procedures of data analysis were one-way analysis of variance and three-way analysis of variance. The Newman-Keuls method was applied for comparing the difference between pairs of groups means. The results were as follow : 1. The fluency score of the children under immediate-reward condition was higher than that under no-reward condition at .05 significance level. 2.The differences between the flexibility and originality scores of the children under immediate-reward and under no-reward condition were not significant at .01 level. 3. The fluency score of the children under immediate-reward condition was higher than that under delayed-reward condition at .01 significance level. 4. The differences between flexibility and originality scores of the children under immediate-reward and under delayed-reward condition were not significant at .01 level. 5. The differences between: fluency, flexibility and originality scores of the children under delayed-reward condition and under no-reward condition were not significant at .01 level. 6. The fluency, flexibility and originality scores of Prathom Suksa 4 and 5 school children were significantly different at at .01 level. 7. The fluency, flexibility and originality scores of Prathom Suksa 4 and 6 school children were significantly different at .01 level. 8. The fluency, flexibility and originality scores of Prathom Suksa 5 and 6 school children were not significantly different at .05 level. 9.The fluency, flexibility and originality scores of the children with high socioeconomic status were higher than those with low socioeconomic status at .01 significance level. 10. There were no significant interactions between reward conditions and grade levels and between reward conditions and socioeconomic status on fluency, flexibility and originality.