British Journal of Educational Psychology, 62,391-396, 1992
SEASON OF BIRTH AND SCHOOL ATTENDANCE BY H. C. M. CARROLL (Department of Education, University College of Swansea)
SUMMARY.Previous research has shown that summer compared to autumn or spring born children have been found to do less well educationally, to be more likely to have their abilities underestimated and to be considered to have behaviour problems, but not to differ in terms of school attendance. That last result is refuted by the results of this study which is based on more than 5000 pupils in their last year of primary education and which reveals that: (a) after controlling for gender and size of family, the summer born have the poorest and the autumn born the highest attendance rates; and (b) in the case of pupils with attendance rates of 80 per cent or less, more of them are summer born and fewer, autumn born. INTRODUCTION "h possible relationship between season of birth and the cognitive, educational and
behavioural characteristicsof children has been the subject of several investigations,though interest in the subjecthas been spasmodic.For example, in the mid-196QsthisJournal carried four articles which were either fully (Armstrong, 1966; Ojha et al., 1966; Williams, 1964) orpartially (Franceand Wiseman, 1966)on the topic. Sincethen the subject hasreceived little attention in any journal, whilst in the case of school attendance its relationship with season of birth has never, as far as the author is aware, been the subject of an article in any journal. More recently, however, Mortimore el al. (1988), in their report on the ILEA longitudinal study of junior school pupils, presented findings which demonstrated seasonal effects in the case of various cognitive attributesand behavioural difficultiesbut not for school attendance. Could the findingsof Mortimoreet al. have been predicted from the results of previous studies? Part of the answer is provided by Williams et al. (1970) who, on the basis of their literature review and empirical research, concluded that summer, compared to spring and autumn born children, i.e., those born in May to August, January to April and September to December respectively,dolesswellon attainment tests,aremore likely tobereferred to child guidance clinics and are over-represented in special classes and schools for children with moderate learning difficulties.They also found that, with respect to thedevelopmentallyleast able entrants to infant school, slightly more of them than one could have expected were summer born. Furthermore, as revealed by France and Wiseman (1966), with respect to the academic attainmentsof junior school pupils in their study, the summer born were found to doleast well, theautumnborndidbest, whilst theperformanceofthespringbornfellbetween the other two groups. However, it is not only academic ability which appears to be related to season of birth. Mortimore et al. (1988) also found that, for each of the three year groups (from first to third year juniors), disproportionally more summer than autumn born children were judged by their respective class teachers to display disturbed behaviour. Furthermore, multivariate analysis revealed that, after taking account of gender and various background factors, season ofbirth was still foundtomakeasignificantcontribution todisturbedbehaviouroverthe three years. Even more recxtly Tarnowski et al. (1990) noted that, in a sample of 222 primary school aged pupils disproportionate numbers of the youngest pupils for all school classes were referred for help because of behaviour problems. 391
392
Season of Birth and School Attendance
In view of the agebehaviour problem results reported by Williams et al. (1970), Mortimore et al. (1988) and Tarnowski et al. (1990), it is indeed surprising that Mortimore et al. did not find age and schoolattendanceto be related for any of the three age groups. There is therefore a need for a further investigationin order to determine whether there really is no relationship between season of birth and school attendance; that need will be met by the following study. METHOD
Sample This comprisedall the pupils of fourth year junior school age in a singlelocal education authority in Wales and numbered 5,429. Instrumenrs These took the form of questionnaires for completion by the headteachers and class teachers and amongst other things contained questions relating to the maximum number of half-day attendancespossible for a pupil attending the school for the first half of the academic year (headteacher’squestionnaire)and for each pupil (class teacher’s questionnaire),hisher name, gender, month of birth, number of half-day absences for the same period and number of younger and older siblings. From these data it was possible to compute for each pupil his/ her percentage attendance rate [(actual attendancehotalpossible attendance) x 1001 for the first half of the year and to determine whether each could be categorised as a Poor Attender, namely a pupil with an attendancerate of 80 per cent or less or a Better Attender (attendance rate greater than 80 per cent). This arbitrary cut-off point was chosen because it was considered to constitutea meaningful amountof absence,e.g., was equivalentto missing one day per week throughout the period, and identified a large enough group (7.8 per cent of all the pupils) to be a source of concern. For analysis purposes the pupils were also classified in terms of gender; family size, namely the number of children (including themselves) in their respective families, divided into three groups: one or two, three or four, or five or more children;and season of birth, with those having birthdays in SeptemberDecember, January/April and May/August being defined as autumn, spring and summer born respectively. RESULTS Attendance data and gender were obtained on every single fourth year junior school pupil in the authority,date of birth on all but three pupils and family size on 69.3 per cent of the agegroup. The possibility that the reduced samplemayhave been biased as aconsequence of teachers failing to indicate the number of older and younger siblings for nearly a third of the samplewas explored by comparing the dismbutionsfor the original sampleof 5,429 with the reduced sample of 3,763 for the variables gender and Season of birth. None of the differencesin percentages,e.g., between the proportion of males in the original and reduced samples, was greater than 0.9 per cent and, for both variables, the distributions, compared using the Goodness-of-Fit test (Hays, 1980) were not significantly different statistically. It may be assumed, therefore,that the reduced and completesampleswere probably sufficiently similar for the purposeof generafisingfrom the former to the latter in the subsequentanalyses based on the reduced sample. The relative “effects” of season of birth, gender and family size on attendance were determinedusing the SPSS hierarchicalstepdownanalysis of varianceprogramme(Nieetal., 1975). The programme was thrice run in order that the effect of each independent variable could be determined after taking account of the effects of the other two. Because of the nonnormal distribution of the attendance variable, it was subject to a square root, arcsin transformation in order to meet the analysis of variance requirement of homogeneity of
H. C. M. CARROLL
393
variance. The analyses were then repeated on the transformed dependent variable. Similar results were obtained though they are not presented here. TABLE 1 THERELATIVE EFFECTS OF GENDER, FAMILY SIZEAND SEASON OF BIRTH ON ATENDANCE RATES N
Variable
Effect+
df
F
p-level
Gender
Male Female
1907 1856
-0.06 0.07
1
0.158
0.691
Family
1675 1671 417
0.85 -0.30 -2.19
2
21.643
0.001
Size
1&2 3&4 +5
Season of Birth
Autumn Spring Summer
1199 1311 1253
0.58 0.13 -0.69
2
6.525
0.002
+ The effect is relative to the mean attendance of 92.38 per cent Note: None of the two- or three-way interactions was significant
Table 1reveals that gender did not havea significanteffecton attendancewhereas family size and season of birth both had very significanteffects. In particular, after allowing for the effects of family size and gender, being summer born had the effect of reducing attendanceto 91.7 per cent whereas being autumn born had the effect of increasing it to 93.0 per cent. With respect to the relationship between season of birth and being a Better or Poor Attender, Table 2 shows that, whereas in the case of the Better Attenders there is little differencebetween the proportions born in the autumn, spring and summer, in the case of the Poor Attenders, as revealed by the Simultaneous Test Procedure figures, a significantly greater proportion (40 per cent) was born in the summer than in either the autumn or spring. Furthermore,as shown in the column '% of N' and demonstratedby the Test for Trends, the increase across the autumn, spring and summer seasons in the proportions of PAS is characterised by a significant linear trend. TABLE 2 ATTENDANCE GROUP BY SEASON OF BIRTH
Season of Birth
%ofN
%ofN
%ofN
BA
PA
PA
N
0.074 0.094
1799
Autumn Spring Summer
32.6
N
5001
Chi-squared
12.41** (df=2)
Season of Birth and School Attendance
394
I
Simultaneous Test Procedure
Seasons compared Autumn & Spring Autumn & Summer Spring & Summer
I
I I
Test for Trends
Chi-squared (df=2)
Trend
Chisquared
1.o
Linear trend
9.9** (df=l)
DepaltUre from trend
2.5 (df= 1
9.8** 8.8**
BA: Better Attenders (attendance > 80 per cent)
PA: Poor Attenders (attendance < 8 1 per cent)
Note: All the chi-squared values are of the likelihood ratio not the Pearson kind and have been calculated because the former, relative to the letter, has certain advantages, particularly when comparisons are made between levels of nondichotomous variable (Gabriel, 1966). The test for trends was devised by Bhapkar (1968) and is described by Everitt (1977).
DISCUSSION Contrary to what might have been predicted from the examination by Mortimore et af. (1988) of the attendancedata of their junior school pupils, the results reported in this study indicate that season of birth does appear to be related to attendance in that it was found that: (a) proportionally more Poor Attenders than Better Attenders were summer born; and (b) after controlling for gender and family size, autumn born children had the highest and summer born children the lowest attendance rates. In so far as the findings in this study are in keeping with those which have linked season of birth to behavioml problems (Mortimore et al., 1988; Tarnowski et af., 1990; Williams et af., 1970) academic ability in the infant (Williams et al., 1970) and junior school (France and Wiseman, 1966, Jinks, 1964; Mortimore el al., 198%)and educational disability (Bookbinder, 1967; Williams, 1964), it is necessary to consider the possible reasons behind these links and their educationalimplications. However, before examining those reasons it is necessary to comment on the nonsignificant finding of Mortimore et al. and to consider whether those with poor attendance records have any other problems. Mortimoreet al. reported that the attendanceof their samplewas very good for all years and all seasons of birth. Aside from failing to find a significant relationship between attendanceand seasonof birth, they did not examine the attendancevariable further. Had they done, they might have come up with results similar to those reported in this study, given the similar sample sizes and the unlikely fact that third and fourth year junior school pupils in London and Wales respectively would be very different in terms of attendance and seasons of birth. Douglasand Ross (1965), Fogelman andRichardson(1974) andEaston andEnglehard (1982) have all shown in longitudinalstudies that primary schoolpupils with poor attendance records, compared to those with better attendance records, have lower attainments. Furthermore,otherresearchers,e.g. May (1975), Farrington (1980)andRyan (1982) have found that junior school pupils with attendance problems tend to be seen by their teachers as having behaviour problems. Consequently,one should not be surprised to find that a disproportionate number of such children would be summer born. Concerningthe possiblereasons for the greater problemsof the summerborn, Williams et af.(1970) argued on the basis of research findings that the link between season of birth and various problems is not due to the fact that summer born children may spend less time in school (up to two terms compared to the autumn born in those authorities with a three-term
H. C. M. CARROLL
395
entry for 5-year-olds).Their argument is supported by the study reported here since, in the authority in question, it was normal for the children to begin full-timeprimary education in the September of the academic year in which they were 5 years of age. The more likely explanation - and it is the one favoured by Williams et al. and this author - is that, in general, the summer born are perceived by their teachers and peers to be the least mature physically, socially and academically in the class. Certainly, this view seems to be supported by the finding of Mortimore et al. (1988) that, on the basis of what could be predicted from the verbal reasoning scores of the summer born at the end of primary school, proportionally fewer were placed in the highest, and proportionally more in the lowest ability bands. In so far as the placements were partly based on teacher judgments, other factors, such as the teachers’ less positive opinions about the summer born,must have influenced the teachers’ decisions. If primary school teachers do perceive a disproportionatenumber of the summer born less favourably, can such perceptions lead to some teachers behaving towards some of the summer born in such a way that a significant number of the latter find school less enjoyable and respond by missing school with parental agreement for trivial reasons? Some support for this idea is to be found in a study of pupil absenteeism in the primary school by Carroll (1986) who showed that pupils with poor attendancerecords, compared to pupils of the same age but with better attendance records, were significantly more likely to come from a home in which their school absence at the ages of both 7 and 11 years was considered by the class teacher to be parentally condoned, Given that more of the summer born in this study were Poor Attenders, it is possible that the school absence of a disproportionatenumber of the summer born was parentally condoned and that some of the absence may have been triggered by the way in which they were treated at school by their teacher. More than 20 ycars ago Williams et al. (1970) argued that the disadvantagedposition of the summer born shouldbedealt with by different,not more education.It would seem that thatpleahasnot been heededforitisstill thecase thatthesummerbornhavegreaterproblems, i.e. lower attainments, more behaviour problems and poorer attendance. Williams et al. proposed that more resources should be directed towards meeting the greater needs of the summer born. That proposal is still valid today. Correspondence and requests for reprints should be addressed to Dr Tim Carroll, Department of Education, University College of Swansea, Hendrefoilan, S w a n s e a SA2 7NB.
REFERENCES Armstrong, H. G. (1966). A c o m r s o n of the performance of summer and autumn-born children at eleven and sixteen. Brilish Journal of ducufional Psychology, 36,72-76. Bhapkar. V. P. (1Y68). On the analysis of contingency tables with a quantitative response. Biornefrics. 24,329338. Bookbinder. G. E. (1967). The reponderance of summer-born children in E.S.N. classes: which is responsible: age or length of infant schooeng? Educufional Research, 9,213-218. Carroll, H. C. M. (1986). Parental factors in primary school pupil absenteeism and their possible implications for educational psychologists. Educafional Child Psychology, 3 (3). 206-212. Douglas, J. W. B. & Ross, J. M. (1%5). The effects of absence on primary school performance. BrifishJournal of Educafional Psychology, 35.28-40. Easton, J. Q. & Engelhard. G. (1982). A longitudinal record of elementary school absence and its relationship to reading achievement. Journal of Educafional Research, 75,269-274. Everiu, B. S. (1977). The A n a l y s i ~ofConfingency Tables. London: Cha an and Hall. Farrington, D. (1980). Truancy, delinquency, the home and the school. In r H e r s o v & I. Berg (Eds.). Oul of School. Chichester: Wiley. Fogelman, K . ( & Richardson. K. (1974). School attendance: some results from the National Child Development Study. InB. ’Turner (Ed.), Truancy. London: Ward Lock. France, N. & Wiseman. S. (1966). An educational guidance programme forthe primary school. Brifish Journal of Educalional Psychology, 36.210-226. Gabriel, K. R. (1Y66). Simultaneous test procedures for multiple comparisons of categorical data. Journal of American Sfafisficul hsociafion. 61. 1081-1096. Hays, W. L. (1980). Sfufirdicsfor [he Social Sciences (2nd ed.) London: Holt-Saunders.
396
Season of Birth and School Attendance
Jinks. P. C. (1 964). An investigation into the effect of date of birth on subsequent school performance. Educational Research, 6,220-225. May, D. (1975). Truancy, school absenteeism and delinquency. Scottish EducafionalStudies, 7,97-107. Mortimore, P., Sammons, P.. Stoll, L.. Lewis, D., Ecob, R. (1988). School Matters: The Junior Years. Wells: Open Books. Nie. N. H.. Hull. C. H.. Jenkins, J. G.. Steinbrenner, K. & Bent, D. H. (1975). Statisfical Package for fhe Socinl Sciences (2nd ed.) New York: McGraw-Hill. Ojha, A. B.. Kelvin, R. D. & Lucas, C. J. (1966). A note on season of birth and intelligence. British J O W M ~of Educational Psychology, 36.94-95. Ryan, J. P. (1982). Non-attendance at school. Unpublished report of a research project funded by Lancashire County Council Education Committee. Mancbester: University of Manchester. Tamowski, K. J., Anderson, D. F., Dragman, R. S. & Kelly, P. A. (1990). Disproportionate referrals for child academicjbehaviour problems. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 58,240-243. Williams, P. (1964). Date of birth, backwardness and educational organisation. British J O I U M ~of Educational P ~ c h o l o g y34,241-255. . Williams, P., Davies. P., Evans. R. & Ferguson, N. (1970). Season of birth and cognitive development.Nuture.228, I033 - 1036. (Manuscript received 8th March 1992)
SEASON OF BIRTH AND SCHOOL ATTENDANCE BY H. C. M. CARROLL (Department of Education, University College of Swansea)
SUMMARY.Previous research has shown that summer compared to autumn or spring born children have been found to do less well educationally, to be more likely to have their abilities underestimated and to be considered to have behaviour problems, but not to differ in terms of school attendance. That last result is refuted by the results of this study which is based on more than 5000 pupils in their last year of primary education and which reveals that: (a) after controlling for gender and size of family, the summer born have the poorest and the autumn born the highest attendance rates; and (b) in the case of pupils with attendance rates of 80 per cent or less, more of them are summer born and fewer, autumn born. INTRODUCTION "h possible relationship between season of birth and the cognitive, educational and
behavioural characteristicsof children has been the subject of several investigations,though interest in the subjecthas been spasmodic.For example, in the mid-196QsthisJournal carried four articles which were either fully (Armstrong, 1966; Ojha et al., 1966; Williams, 1964) orpartially (Franceand Wiseman, 1966)on the topic. Sincethen the subject hasreceived little attention in any journal, whilst in the case of school attendance its relationship with season of birth has never, as far as the author is aware, been the subject of an article in any journal. More recently, however, Mortimore el al. (1988), in their report on the ILEA longitudinal study of junior school pupils, presented findings which demonstrated seasonal effects in the case of various cognitive attributesand behavioural difficultiesbut not for school attendance. Could the findingsof Mortimoreet al. have been predicted from the results of previous studies? Part of the answer is provided by Williams et al. (1970) who, on the basis of their literature review and empirical research, concluded that summer, compared to spring and autumn born children, i.e., those born in May to August, January to April and September to December respectively,dolesswellon attainment tests,aremore likely tobereferred to child guidance clinics and are over-represented in special classes and schools for children with moderate learning difficulties.They also found that, with respect to thedevelopmentallyleast able entrants to infant school, slightly more of them than one could have expected were summer born. Furthermore, as revealed by France and Wiseman (1966), with respect to the academic attainmentsof junior school pupils in their study, the summer born were found to doleast well, theautumnborndidbest, whilst theperformanceofthespringbornfellbetween the other two groups. However, it is not only academic ability which appears to be related to season of birth. Mortimore et al. (1988) also found that, for each of the three year groups (from first to third year juniors), disproportionally more summer than autumn born children were judged by their respective class teachers to display disturbed behaviour. Furthermore, multivariate analysis revealed that, after taking account of gender and various background factors, season ofbirth was still foundtomakeasignificantcontribution todisturbedbehaviouroverthe three years. Even more recxtly Tarnowski et al. (1990) noted that, in a sample of 222 primary school aged pupils disproportionate numbers of the youngest pupils for all school classes were referred for help because of behaviour problems. 391
392
Season of Birth and School Attendance
In view of the agebehaviour problem results reported by Williams et al. (1970), Mortimore et al. (1988) and Tarnowski et al. (1990), it is indeed surprising that Mortimore et al. did not find age and schoolattendanceto be related for any of the three age groups. There is therefore a need for a further investigationin order to determine whether there really is no relationship between season of birth and school attendance; that need will be met by the following study. METHOD
Sample This comprisedall the pupils of fourth year junior school age in a singlelocal education authority in Wales and numbered 5,429. Instrumenrs These took the form of questionnaires for completion by the headteachers and class teachers and amongst other things contained questions relating to the maximum number of half-day attendancespossible for a pupil attending the school for the first half of the academic year (headteacher’squestionnaire)and for each pupil (class teacher’s questionnaire),hisher name, gender, month of birth, number of half-day absences for the same period and number of younger and older siblings. From these data it was possible to compute for each pupil his/ her percentage attendance rate [(actual attendancehotalpossible attendance) x 1001 for the first half of the year and to determine whether each could be categorised as a Poor Attender, namely a pupil with an attendancerate of 80 per cent or less or a Better Attender (attendance rate greater than 80 per cent). This arbitrary cut-off point was chosen because it was considered to constitutea meaningful amountof absence,e.g., was equivalentto missing one day per week throughout the period, and identified a large enough group (7.8 per cent of all the pupils) to be a source of concern. For analysis purposes the pupils were also classified in terms of gender; family size, namely the number of children (including themselves) in their respective families, divided into three groups: one or two, three or four, or five or more children;and season of birth, with those having birthdays in SeptemberDecember, January/April and May/August being defined as autumn, spring and summer born respectively. RESULTS Attendance data and gender were obtained on every single fourth year junior school pupil in the authority,date of birth on all but three pupils and family size on 69.3 per cent of the agegroup. The possibility that the reduced samplemayhave been biased as aconsequence of teachers failing to indicate the number of older and younger siblings for nearly a third of the samplewas explored by comparing the dismbutionsfor the original sampleof 5,429 with the reduced sample of 3,763 for the variables gender and Season of birth. None of the differencesin percentages,e.g., between the proportion of males in the original and reduced samples, was greater than 0.9 per cent and, for both variables, the distributions, compared using the Goodness-of-Fit test (Hays, 1980) were not significantly different statistically. It may be assumed, therefore,that the reduced and completesampleswere probably sufficiently similar for the purposeof generafisingfrom the former to the latter in the subsequentanalyses based on the reduced sample. The relative “effects” of season of birth, gender and family size on attendance were determinedusing the SPSS hierarchicalstepdownanalysis of varianceprogramme(Nieetal., 1975). The programme was thrice run in order that the effect of each independent variable could be determined after taking account of the effects of the other two. Because of the nonnormal distribution of the attendance variable, it was subject to a square root, arcsin transformation in order to meet the analysis of variance requirement of homogeneity of
H. C. M. CARROLL
393
variance. The analyses were then repeated on the transformed dependent variable. Similar results were obtained though they are not presented here. TABLE 1 THERELATIVE EFFECTS OF GENDER, FAMILY SIZEAND SEASON OF BIRTH ON ATENDANCE RATES N
Variable
Effect+
df
F
p-level
Gender
Male Female
1907 1856
-0.06 0.07
1
0.158
0.691
Family
1675 1671 417
0.85 -0.30 -2.19
2
21.643
0.001
Size
1&2 3&4 +5
Season of Birth
Autumn Spring Summer
1199 1311 1253
0.58 0.13 -0.69
2
6.525
0.002
+ The effect is relative to the mean attendance of 92.38 per cent Note: None of the two- or three-way interactions was significant
Table 1reveals that gender did not havea significanteffecton attendancewhereas family size and season of birth both had very significanteffects. In particular, after allowing for the effects of family size and gender, being summer born had the effect of reducing attendanceto 91.7 per cent whereas being autumn born had the effect of increasing it to 93.0 per cent. With respect to the relationship between season of birth and being a Better or Poor Attender, Table 2 shows that, whereas in the case of the Better Attenders there is little differencebetween the proportions born in the autumn, spring and summer, in the case of the Poor Attenders, as revealed by the Simultaneous Test Procedure figures, a significantly greater proportion (40 per cent) was born in the summer than in either the autumn or spring. Furthermore,as shown in the column '% of N' and demonstratedby the Test for Trends, the increase across the autumn, spring and summer seasons in the proportions of PAS is characterised by a significant linear trend. TABLE 2 ATTENDANCE GROUP BY SEASON OF BIRTH
Season of Birth
%ofN
%ofN
%ofN
BA
PA
PA
N
0.074 0.094
1799
Autumn Spring Summer
32.6
N
5001
Chi-squared
12.41** (df=2)
Season of Birth and School Attendance
394
I
Simultaneous Test Procedure
Seasons compared Autumn & Spring Autumn & Summer Spring & Summer
I
I I
Test for Trends
Chi-squared (df=2)
Trend
Chisquared
1.o
Linear trend
9.9** (df=l)
DepaltUre from trend
2.5 (df= 1
9.8** 8.8**
BA: Better Attenders (attendance > 80 per cent)
PA: Poor Attenders (attendance < 8 1 per cent)
Note: All the chi-squared values are of the likelihood ratio not the Pearson kind and have been calculated because the former, relative to the letter, has certain advantages, particularly when comparisons are made between levels of nondichotomous variable (Gabriel, 1966). The test for trends was devised by Bhapkar (1968) and is described by Everitt (1977).
DISCUSSION Contrary to what might have been predicted from the examination by Mortimore et af. (1988) of the attendancedata of their junior school pupils, the results reported in this study indicate that season of birth does appear to be related to attendance in that it was found that: (a) proportionally more Poor Attenders than Better Attenders were summer born; and (b) after controlling for gender and family size, autumn born children had the highest and summer born children the lowest attendance rates. In so far as the findings in this study are in keeping with those which have linked season of birth to behavioml problems (Mortimore et al., 1988; Tarnowski et af., 1990; Williams et af., 1970) academic ability in the infant (Williams et al., 1970) and junior school (France and Wiseman, 1966, Jinks, 1964; Mortimore el al., 198%)and educational disability (Bookbinder, 1967; Williams, 1964), it is necessary to consider the possible reasons behind these links and their educationalimplications. However, before examining those reasons it is necessary to comment on the nonsignificant finding of Mortimore et al. and to consider whether those with poor attendance records have any other problems. Mortimoreet al. reported that the attendanceof their samplewas very good for all years and all seasons of birth. Aside from failing to find a significant relationship between attendanceand seasonof birth, they did not examine the attendancevariable further. Had they done, they might have come up with results similar to those reported in this study, given the similar sample sizes and the unlikely fact that third and fourth year junior school pupils in London and Wales respectively would be very different in terms of attendance and seasons of birth. Douglasand Ross (1965), Fogelman andRichardson(1974) andEaston andEnglehard (1982) have all shown in longitudinalstudies that primary schoolpupils with poor attendance records, compared to those with better attendance records, have lower attainments. Furthermore,otherresearchers,e.g. May (1975), Farrington (1980)andRyan (1982) have found that junior school pupils with attendance problems tend to be seen by their teachers as having behaviour problems. Consequently,one should not be surprised to find that a disproportionate number of such children would be summer born. Concerningthe possiblereasons for the greater problemsof the summerborn, Williams et af.(1970) argued on the basis of research findings that the link between season of birth and various problems is not due to the fact that summer born children may spend less time in school (up to two terms compared to the autumn born in those authorities with a three-term
H. C. M. CARROLL
395
entry for 5-year-olds).Their argument is supported by the study reported here since, in the authority in question, it was normal for the children to begin full-timeprimary education in the September of the academic year in which they were 5 years of age. The more likely explanation - and it is the one favoured by Williams et al. and this author - is that, in general, the summer born are perceived by their teachers and peers to be the least mature physically, socially and academically in the class. Certainly, this view seems to be supported by the finding of Mortimore et al. (1988) that, on the basis of what could be predicted from the verbal reasoning scores of the summer born at the end of primary school, proportionally fewer were placed in the highest, and proportionally more in the lowest ability bands. In so far as the placements were partly based on teacher judgments, other factors, such as the teachers’ less positive opinions about the summer born,must have influenced the teachers’ decisions. If primary school teachers do perceive a disproportionatenumber of the summer born less favourably, can such perceptions lead to some teachers behaving towards some of the summer born in such a way that a significant number of the latter find school less enjoyable and respond by missing school with parental agreement for trivial reasons? Some support for this idea is to be found in a study of pupil absenteeism in the primary school by Carroll (1986) who showed that pupils with poor attendancerecords, compared to pupils of the same age but with better attendance records, were significantly more likely to come from a home in which their school absence at the ages of both 7 and 11 years was considered by the class teacher to be parentally condoned, Given that more of the summer born in this study were Poor Attenders, it is possible that the school absence of a disproportionatenumber of the summer born was parentally condoned and that some of the absence may have been triggered by the way in which they were treated at school by their teacher. More than 20 ycars ago Williams et al. (1970) argued that the disadvantagedposition of the summer born shouldbedealt with by different,not more education.It would seem that thatpleahasnot been heededforitisstill thecase thatthesummerbornhavegreaterproblems, i.e. lower attainments, more behaviour problems and poorer attendance. Williams et al. proposed that more resources should be directed towards meeting the greater needs of the summer born. That proposal is still valid today. Correspondence and requests for reprints should be addressed to Dr Tim Carroll, Department of Education, University College of Swansea, Hendrefoilan, S w a n s e a SA2 7NB.
REFERENCES Armstrong, H. G. (1966). A c o m r s o n of the performance of summer and autumn-born children at eleven and sixteen. Brilish Journal of ducufional Psychology, 36,72-76. Bhapkar. V. P. (1Y68). On the analysis of contingency tables with a quantitative response. Biornefrics. 24,329338. Bookbinder. G. E. (1967). The reponderance of summer-born children in E.S.N. classes: which is responsible: age or length of infant schooeng? Educufional Research, 9,213-218. Carroll, H. C. M. (1986). Parental factors in primary school pupil absenteeism and their possible implications for educational psychologists. Educafional Child Psychology, 3 (3). 206-212. Douglas, J. W. B. & Ross, J. M. (1%5). The effects of absence on primary school performance. BrifishJournal of Educafional Psychology, 35.28-40. Easton, J. Q. & Engelhard. G. (1982). A longitudinal record of elementary school absence and its relationship to reading achievement. Journal of Educafional Research, 75,269-274. Everiu, B. S. (1977). The A n a l y s i ~ofConfingency Tables. London: Cha an and Hall. Farrington, D. (1980). Truancy, delinquency, the home and the school. In r H e r s o v & I. Berg (Eds.). Oul of School. Chichester: Wiley. Fogelman, K . ( & Richardson. K. (1974). School attendance: some results from the National Child Development Study. InB. ’Turner (Ed.), Truancy. London: Ward Lock. France, N. & Wiseman. S. (1966). An educational guidance programme forthe primary school. Brifish Journal of Educalional Psychology, 36.210-226. Gabriel, K. R. (1Y66). Simultaneous test procedures for multiple comparisons of categorical data. Journal of American Sfafisficul hsociafion. 61. 1081-1096. Hays, W. L. (1980). Sfufirdicsfor [he Social Sciences (2nd ed.) London: Holt-Saunders.
396
Season of Birth and School Attendance
Jinks. P. C. (1 964). An investigation into the effect of date of birth on subsequent school performance. Educational Research, 6,220-225. May, D. (1975). Truancy, school absenteeism and delinquency. Scottish EducafionalStudies, 7,97-107. Mortimore, P., Sammons, P.. Stoll, L.. Lewis, D., Ecob, R. (1988). School Matters: The Junior Years. Wells: Open Books. Nie. N. H.. Hull. C. H.. Jenkins, J. G.. Steinbrenner, K. & Bent, D. H. (1975). Statisfical Package for fhe Socinl Sciences (2nd ed.) New York: McGraw-Hill. Ojha, A. B.. Kelvin, R. D. & Lucas, C. J. (1966). A note on season of birth and intelligence. British J O W M ~of Educational Psychology, 36.94-95. Ryan, J. P. (1982). Non-attendance at school. Unpublished report of a research project funded by Lancashire County Council Education Committee. Mancbester: University of Manchester. Tamowski, K. J., Anderson, D. F., Dragman, R. S. & Kelly, P. A. (1990). Disproportionate referrals for child academicjbehaviour problems. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 58,240-243. Williams, P. (1964). Date of birth, backwardness and educational organisation. British J O I U M ~of Educational P ~ c h o l o g y34,241-255. . Williams, P., Davies. P., Evans. R. & Ferguson, N. (1970). Season of birth and cognitive development.Nuture.228, I033 - 1036. (Manuscript received 8th March 1992)
