Children's Competence and the Agreement and Stability of Self and Child-Descriptions

Abstract

In a longitudinal study CCQ-descriptions of children aged 7 to 12 were given by teachers, mothers, peers, and the child him/herself. The consistency of self-and child-descriptions, over time and over environments, was indicated by consensus (agreement in child-descriptions between pairs of referent persons), mutuality (agreement between a child's self-description and descriptions by referent persons), and stability (consistency of descriptions over a period of time). A longitudinal model was tested in which the consistency of self-and child-descriptions was expected to have a causal relation with two aspects of competence, i.e. school achievement and peer competence. The resulting model showed stability over time of the latent variable "consistency of self-and child-descriptions", formed by the three groups of consistency-indices. A small, reciprocal relation between the consistency of self-and child-descriptions and school achievement was found. A strong effect of this consistency on the peer competence of a child was found. In addition, intelligence of the child was found to have a considerable effect on the consistency of self-and child-descriptions. These results suggest the importance of consistency in the ideas of various referent persons in the development of competence on different domains.

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