Hello! My name is Hanna Enos, and I’m a rising junior majoring in Psychology with minors in Neuroscience, Linguistics, and Applied Statistics. Outside of school, I love to knit and crochet. Under the guidance of my mentor Dr. Melissa Libertus, I have been awarded the Brackenridge Fellowship for my project examining the frequency of parent-child money talk during pretend grocery shopping. I have been an undergraduate research assistant for the Kid’s Thinking (KiT) Lab since Summer 2023, and I am excited for this opportunity to conduct my own independent project! 🙂
People use math skills in a variety of contexts during everyday life, including during monetary transactions. People count money, use number symbols to determine the value of bills, and add when calculating totals. The home learning environment is important to children’s development of math skills as before children even enter formal schooling, they are exposed to math and math-related topics that influence their learning and development. Understanding the home learning environment of children before they enter formal schooling can lead to a better understand of the activities that engage parents and children in math-related conversations
My project focuses on pretend grocery shopping scenarios in which parents and children play with toys resembling objects found in grocery stores, mimicking a real life grocery shopping scenario that has ample opportunities for parents and children to talk about math and money. Through describing the way parents and children talk about money during this play grocery scenario, I hope to better understand children’s early exposure to money and math in the home learning environment, which is important to children’s development of math and money skills.
I plan to turn my research from this summer into a BPhil project further examining the money talk of parents and children. As such, I intend to use this summer to draft an application for BPhil candidacy and further explore the literature on children’s development of math and money skills. After I graduate, I plan to pursue a PhD within the field of Cognitive Psychology. I believe the interdisciplinary cohorts of the Brackenridge Fellowship will make me a better researcher by allowing me to learn about research methodologies and perspectives different than mine. I also look forward to bettering my skills in communicating my research to a diverse audience. All in all, I’m grateful for this opportunity to conduct my research and excited for what the rest of the summer has in store!