Field dependence--independence and performance with the passive transformation

An investigation of the influence of children's levels of field dependence-independence on their performance with the passive transformation is presented. Eighty 6th graders classified as field dependent or field independent were presented with sentence-question combinations, each in either the active or passive voice, and numbers of correct responses were recorded. Results showed that field-independent subjects performed better over-all than did field-dependent subjects. The three-way interaction of field dependence-independence, sentence voice, and question voice was also significant. Field-dependent subjects performed significantly more poorly on the active-passive and passive-active combinations than on the active-active and passive-passive combinations. There were no significant differences among the four treatments within the field-independent subjects. Thus field-dependent subjects had greatest difficulty with combinations requiring them to isolate the essential elements of a sentence and use them in a different form; field-independent subjects did not experience this difficulty.