Mothers' Accuracy in Predicting Their Children's IQs: Its Relationship to Antecedent Variables, Mothers' Academic Achievement Demands, and Children's Achievement

Abstract

How accurate are mothers in judging their children's IQs? Is there a relationship between mothers' accuracy and their children's academic achievement? Are mothers' beliefs about their children's cognitive ability related to the achievement demands mothers place on their children and their children's actual academic performance? To answer these questions, we administered to 70 grade-school children the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Revised (WISC-R), and their mothers were asked to estimate their children's IQs. Eighty percent of the mothers gave estimates within one standard deviation of their children's IQs. Most mothers overestimated their children's IQs. Accuracy in predicting child's IQ did not vary as a function of the child's gender or age, mother's level of education or experience with children, or family's SES. The type of errors (overestimations or underestimations), however, varied by IQ. Accuracy did not predict the children's achievement or school grades, but the mothers' demands were positively related to their beliefs about their children's ability and to the children's level of achievement.