Narratives of historical events become more complex from 8th to 11th grade¶

Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study · qualitative r2 · q2
Currency · newest study 2014 · not yet checked against its sources · not reviewed by a person · overdue for a recheck since 2019: baselines and conditions change

Subclaims¶

q2 i? 89% of 8th-grade narratives simplified the historical events versus 40% in 11th grade; complexity was significantly higher among 11th graders (Fisher's p < .01). → Mario Carretero & Floor van Alphen 2014

Evidence¶

Mario Carretero & Floor van Alphen 2014¶

Mario Carretero & Floor van Alphen. (2014). Do Master Narratives Change Among High School Students? A Characterization of How National History Is Represented. Cognition and Instruction, 32(3), 290-312. https://doi.org/10.1080/07370008.2014.919298

q2 · i? · qualitative · r2

Coding of the historical-events characteristic in the 38 interview narratives, distinguishing simple monocausal liberation accounts from complex multicausal accounts. The article states 'the percentage is significantly higher in 8th graders (Fisher's p < .01)' for simplification.

"In 11% of the 8th graders and 60% of the 11th graders, the narrative is characterized by more complexity, as illustrated below:"

Discussion¶

Related Claims¶

• Older students more often represent the historical subject as heterogeneous — related
• Predominantly master-narrative accounts drop from 83% in 8th grade to 25% in 11th grade — related
• Nation concept shifts from essentialist to constructivist across grades — related
• Identification with the historical subject ('us') does not change across grades — related
• Identification is statistically unrelated to the other three narrative characteristics — related
• Students tend to explain historical events from an intentionalist, personalistic point of view — related