What did Douglas find about working-class students' intellectual test scores compared with middle-class students?

• A. Higher than middle class students
• B. No difference between classes
• C. Lower than middle class students
• D. Scores improve with age

Answer: (C)

Social class shapes performance on intellectual tests. Douglas found that working-class students scored lower on intellectual tests than their middle-class peers, reflecting how differences in home and school environments influence cognitive development and test-taking skills. Factors such as language-rich home environments, parental education and expectations, access to books and stimulating activities, and unequal school resources give middle-class students more opportunities to develop the skills that tests measure. Since standardized tests tend to reward experiences more common in advantaged settings, the gap tends to show up as lower scores for working-class students rather than as a difference in innate ability. In short, the finding is that working-class students score lower than middle-class students.