CRITICAL INFLUENCES IN THE ORIGINS OF COMPETENCE1

Abstract

The research to be described in this paper focuses on the question of the experiential sources of human competence, a topic I have been performing research on continuously since 1958. Because my field has been psychology, I have been examining the experiential rather than the genetic or nutritional or other roots of competence. For ten years or so I studied the development of abilities during the first six months of life. I reported on that work at the Merrill-Palmer Institute in 1968 (White, 1969) and summarized its totality in a small book in 1971 (White, 1971). In that research effort, I learned quickly that the scientific study of experiential or environmental factors is con siderably more difficult than the study of developmental outcomes such as language or intellectual skills. Plotting changing skill levels is child's play compared to coping with the problem of which aspects of the en vironment translate into which types of experiences that have substan tial effects on the development of skills. I became involved in disputes with people about measurement. 1969 statement on that issue still expresses my position: My policy has always been to measure as well as I can what I believe merits measurement, rather than to measure only what I can measure with unquestionably high precision. By this statement I do not mean to advocate the demise of the kind of child

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