The effects of classroom noise on the acquisition rate of a site vocabulary by kindergarten children
Date
1975
Authors
Chamberlain, Lawrence Alban
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Abstract
This study investigated the efficiency with which kindergarten children acquired a sight vocabulary in a quiet condition with no planned noise (Quiet 60-70 db) and in one of three conditions (Noise 60-70 db, Noise 70-80 db, Noise 80-90 db) in which a recording of classroom type noise was played. The two levels of sex and the four experimental conditions generated a two by four mixed measures factorial design.
Each subject met individually with the experimenter in a small room in the school, was pre-tested on the four sight words, given one pre-training trial, then trained to a criterion of two successive errorless trials. The dependent variable was the number of trials taken by each subject to reach criterion. Data collected on those subjects who knew one or more of the four words on the pre-test, or failed to reach criterion before 20 trials were not included in the statistical test of significant difference.
Since the hypothesis of homogeneity of variance was tested and rejected, a parametric test of significant difference using the analysis of variance method was not applied to the data. A non-parametric test of significant difference (Kruskal-Wallis one-way analysis of variance by ranks) was applied to the data which revealed no significant difference. However, fewer subjects failed to learn the words in the quieter conditions than in the noisier conditions. Suggestions for further research of the effects of noise on human behaviour were also proposed.