Qualitative Differences in Development of Yielding Behavior by Elementary School Children

Abstract

Qualitative as well as quantitative differences were found in the yielding behavior of elementary school children. The “naive majority” technique was used to administer the Visual Judgment Scale to 192 groups of 6 children each. 12 boys and 12 girls from each of the first 8 grades were critical Ss and were asked to make judgments in social pressure (public responses), social in-fluence (private responses after hearing others), and non-influence (private, independent responses) situations. Younger children yielded more than older children and girls more than boys. Qualitatively, only yielders in the eighth grade were more compliant (yielding more publicly than privately) than ele-mentary school yielders in general, and until the sixth grade, boys were more compliant than girls. The possible effects of puberty and other factors on these findings are discussed.