A Developmental Study On Self-Perceptions Of Competence In Preschoolers

Self-perceptions of competence,as a key component of various motivation constructs and expectancy theories,are people's self-evaluative judgments about their ability to accomplish certain tasks (Harter,1985a). Closely related to meta-cognition,it is a form of expression of the individual's self-consciousness,and thus has an important theoretical position.Under the influence of various subjective factors,the individual may or may not perceive his competence,may perceive it precisely or may deviate. However,it is these perceptions that constitute the individual phenomenal field,and people tend to construct their lives according to what they perceive of their phenomenal fields-the perceived actualities are people's direct actualities,and will eventually decide people's performance and direction of development. Therefore,the study of perceptions of competence also holds an important realistic significance.Restricted by the means of evaluation,former studies focused on the subjects of children of higher grades,and concentrated on the influence of their perceptions of competence in the self-regulated learning. However,experience indicates that preschoolers have shown some signs of self-perceptions. Such scholars as Bandura also affirm that young children have already held some perceptions and beliefs about their competence,which is of great significance to their future development. So far,however,systematic empirical studies have not been found. This paper intended to make an exploration on the general tendency and developmental characteristics of preschoolers' self-perceptions of competence.Through six experiments,the research made a systematic and thorough study of the children in senior,middle and junior class in kindergarten respectively on the developmental characteristics and potential influential factors of the self-perceptions of their competence. The research was on three important domains that were physical excise,human association,and cognition. Considering preschoolers' standard of development,this research set concrete situations,and combined and contrasted oral reports with observations so as to demonstrate children's self-conceptions of competence more comprehensively and accurately.The first part concerned the self-conceptions of competence in the field of children's physical exercise. It was made up of three experiments:Experiment I used Bandura's classical pattern of the measurement of self-efficacy for reference. Before and after the children's three trial jumps respectively,they were asked to assess their abilities to fulfill a series of tasks of standing long jumps from easy to difficult. In the end,they were asked once again to make an overall assessment at their maximum competence in each event. The results were:(a) Children in the junior class over-esteemed their long-jumping abilities under general experience,and the tendency was not considerably amended by direct experience;the esteem of the children in middle and senior classes was relatively conservative,but then showed a tendency of over-esteem after three trial jumps. However,both the conservativeness and the over-esteem had a significant correlation to their actual abilities to some extent,showing that a certain realistic basis for the over-esteem had been laid in the middle and latter periods of the preschoolers;(b) Children were inclined to over-esteem their competence in multi-items than in a single event,but the assessment in multi-items more delicately demonstrates children's understanding of the relationship between the degree of difficulty and their competence and the application of their understanding in self-assessment.Experiment II applies progressive guidance,further studying the influence of more definite guidance and more immediate feedback over children's display and self-perceptions of their competence. The findings showed that:(a) The same as the display of their competence,children showed a tendency of gradual increase in their self-perceptions of competence;(b) The best performance of the children in a...