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The Zoo Task: A Novel Metacognitive Problem-Solving Task Developed with a Sample of African American Children from Schools in High Poverty Communities

Accepted version
Peer-reviewed

Type

Article

Change log

Authors

Patel, Jwalin Nishith 
Aldercotte, Amanda 
Serpell, Zewelanji 
Parr, Teresa 

Abstract

Metacognition is important for monitoring and regulating cognitive processes, decision-making, problem-solving and learning. Despite widespread interest in metacognition, measuring metacognition in children poses a significant challenge. Some qualitative and observational metrics exist, but are restricted by scalability, range of metacognitive components measured, and use of different metrics compared with tasks for adults. We developed the Zoo Task - a novel, scalable, paper-based task that measures multiple aspects of metacognition that is less conflated by other variables like verbal ability and does not require video recording children. Children (N = 204, ages 7-12 years, mostly from African American backgrounds) attending schools in high poverty urban areas contributed to its development. In addition, they completed a standard metacognition of memory task similar to those already used with children and adults. The results indicate that the novel task trials are reliable and have good criterion validity. The Zoo Task could bridge the current gap between existing metrics of metacognition for children and adults.

Description

Keywords

39 Education, 3904 Specialist Studies In Education, 52 Psychology, Clinical Research, Pediatric, Minority Health, Behavioral and Social Science, Mental Health, Basic Behavioral and Social Science, 1.2 Psychological and socioeconomic processes, Mental health

Journal Title

Psychological Assessment

Conference Name

Journal ISSN

1040-3590

Volume Title

Publisher

American Psychological Association

Rights

All rights reserved
Sponsorship
United States Department of Education (R305A110932)
The research reported here was supported by the Institute of Education Sciences, U.S. Department of Education, through Grant R305A110932 to the University of Cambridge. The opinions expressed are those of the authors and do not represent views of the Institute or the U.S. Department of Education.