Children's Saving: A Study in the Development of Economic BehaviourThis book presents an alternative approach to the study of the emergence of economic awareness during childhood: a new developmental economic psychology. In the past, attempts to study the emergence of children's economic consciousness have failed to take account of the practical nature of the "economic" in the history of western cultures. Economic socialization has been seen as the acquisition of abstract knowledge about the institutions of adult economic culture. The child has been seen as a spectator, acquiring knowledge of that culture, but never really part of it. However, economic actions, in essence, are directed not towards the attainment of knowledge but rather towards the practical solution of problems of resource allocation imposed by constraint. Children, just like adults, are faced with practical problems of resource allocation. Their response to these problems may be different from those of adults but no less "economic" for that. This realization forms the heart of this book. In it children are seen as both inhabitants of their own "playground" economic subculture and actors in the wider economic world of adults, solving, or attempting to solve, practical economic problems. In order to highlight this "child centered" approach the authors studied the way children tackle the particular problems posed by limitations of income. How do children learn, a) the relationship between choices available in the present and the future, b) to spread their limited financial resources over time into the future and c) about the strategies, such as banking, that allow them to protect those resources from threats and temptations. In short, how do children learn to save? This volume goes some way to answering these and related questions and in so doing sets up an alternative framework for the study of the emergence of economic awareness. |
Contents
How and why children save by Sharone L Maital | 8 |
Childrens saving as an example of economic development | 9 |
The development of functional saving in a play economy | 17 |
Extending the boundaries of the play economy | 43 |
Social influences on childrens saving | 63 |
Contrasting the economic social and developmental significance | 85 |
Cognitive approaches to economic development revisited | 91 |
towards an integral developmental economic psychology | 125 |
References | 139 |
Author Index | 149 |
Other editions - View all
Children's Saving: A Study in the Development of Economic Behaviour Edmund J. S. Sonuga-Barke,Paul Webley No preview available - 2017 |
Children's Saving: A Study in the Development of Economic Behaviour Edmund J. S. Sonuga-Barke,Paul Webley No preview available - 2019 |
Common terms and phrases
12 year olds adults age groups asked bank Berti board game building societies Chapter child children to save children's economic children's saving children's understanding choice Circuit cognitive context cultural deposits detour development of economic developmental developmental economic Developmental Psychology economic actions economic behaviour economic function economic socialisation economic world effective encourage saving experimenter function of saving functional saving functional understanding future George Butterworth Henry's cat hide income constraint interaction interest rates intertemporal choice interviews Jahoda Mischel money box non-functional number of tokens older children parents piggy bank play economy pocket money present problems put money questions recognised relationship reward robber squares saving behaviour saving responses saving strategies savings boxes savings habit savings institutions significant situations social social representations Sonuga-Barke and Webley spending subjects suggested sweet purchase temptation theories things threat understanding of saving value of saving video arcade young children
References to this book
Children's Thinking about Cultural Universals Jere E. Brophy,Janet Alleman No preview available - 2006 |