Helen L. Koch

Popularity in Preschool Children: Some Related Factors and a Technique for Its Measurement

Popularity has been guaged in lay enterprises and scientific studies in various ways. Choice of the most popular by a simple voting procedure or the selection of traits making for popularity (3) by such a device has resulted in specious yields, propaganda and immediate pressures of various sorts being marring factors. The voting technique, furthermore, usually merely accomplishes the selection of a single individual, seldom making possible the adequate ranking of all members of a social unit. The method extended to include the specification of a limited number of preferred individuals is probably an improvement over the single vote. This procedure has been employed by Hardy (5), for instance, who asked her subjects to name the 5 school fellows liked best, and by Hsia (6), whose subjects were charged with listing the 4 members of their school class whom they would enjoy most inviting to a party. In these latter methods the frequency of the appearance of a pupils name on the lists furnishes the basis for determining his ranking in popularity. To the extent that some pupils are occasionally not named at all on the ballots, that circumstances prevailing at the time the judgments are registered may weigh heavily, and that not all pupils receive equally thoughtful consideration, the method has limitations.

Rachel Stutsman, Mental Measurement of Preschool Children (Helen Lois Koch)

Abstract Rachel Stutsman. Mental Measurement of Preschool Children. Yonkers, N. Y.: World Book Co., 1931. Pp. x+368.