Scientism and Values.pdf - Ludwig von Mises Institute

188 Scientism and Values
lished data resulting from the tests and measurements are usually
presented on graphs with the chronological age on the horizontal
axis and the growth age on the vertical axis. The height ages for
a child are plotted above the corresponding chronological ages,
and the points. are joined successively by straight lines. All the
other growth ages are plotted in like manner on the same graph.
Since all the attributes usually increase in time, the graph of a
child's growth consists of a series of lines ascending across the
graph to the right.
Olson and Hughes (15) thought "it would be of interest in
testing hypotheses of children as wholes [sic!] to study the center of
gravity of growth systems and the relation of separate aspects of
growth to the whole." In order to do this they plotted an "organismic
age" curve for each child so studied. The organismic age for
anyone chronological age was computed by averaging all the
growth ages for that chronological age. After an organismic age
was computed for each chronological age, the points were plotted
and connected in sequence, thus producing the organismic age
curve.
After studying many children by means of growth age curves,
Olson has arrived at some conclusions and definitions, a theory
of growth, and a number of applications of his views to the problems
of education. In the remainder of this essay I shall describe
and criticize several of these ideas. I am omitting for the sake
of brevity any critical examination of the raw "facts," the bases
upon which they rest, and their statistical manipulation. In the
present discussion I shall assume that growth curves are a "true"
representation of the attribute for which they stand.
Pattern.
A pattern of growth refers to the relationship of various measured
characteristics within an individual at a given point in time, or to a
succession of changes with time. Thus a child who at the age ten has
a high mental age, a high reading age, and a somewhat lower height
age, weight age, carpal age, and dental age, differs from one who has
high physical ages and relatively low mental and achievement ages.