week 10 - conceptual development Flashcards
What does “Theory of mind” refer to?
The ability to explain, predict, and interpret people’s behaviour by attributing mental states to self and others.
Psychological tests demonstrate conceptual shift in understanding theory of mind around what age?
4 years old.
What happens in the Maxi test (Wimmer & Perner, 1983)?
Max puts his chocolate in the green cupboard and goes out to play, while he is out his mother transfers the chocolate to the blue cupboard, when max comes back for his chocolate where will he look?
What does a child need to understand to pass the Maxi test?
Another child can have a false belief about the state of the world. Behaviour is explained by a person’s beliefs rather than reality.
What are the results fo the Maxi test?
Most 3 year olds fail, some 4-5 year olds pass, nearly all 6-9 year olds pass.
What is the smarties test (Gopnik & Astington 1988)?
A false beliefs test, shows children a smarties tube, asks what’s inside. Reveals pencil, child is surprised. Asks child what mum will think is inside when she comes in, below 4 years old “pencils” above 4 years old “smarties”.
What is the Appearance-Reality test (Flavell et al. 1983) and what were the results?
Child is shown a sponge that looks like a rock, and believes it is a rock because it looks like one. Most 3 year olds fail, most 4-5 year olds pass.
What do children need to pass the appearance-reality test?
Hold two different mental representations of an object. Understand that they can have a belief that differs from the true state of the world.
How do early sociocognitive skills based on attention to others develop in childhood?
By 18 months children can follow another’s gaze to find hidden objects.
By 24 months children can interpret another’s request based on an understanding of what the other person can and cannot see.
By 30 months child can take into account what another person has seen or not seen in the past.
What happened in the Violation of expectation method (Onishi & Baillargeon, 2005)?
A non-verbal unexpected location test. Woman sees a toy move from dark to light box, but doesn’t see it move back to the dark box. By 15 months, children expect woman to reach into the box where woman last saw the toy.
When can children understand that people’s desires guide their actions?
By 12 months. By 18 months is understood even if the desire doesn’t match their own.
What were the results of the food sharing experiment (Repacholi & Gopnik 1997)?
18 month olds, but not 14 month olds, understand that a person’s desired food can differ from their own.
Pretend play demonstrates the developing ability for children to understand what?
that beliefs are different from reality.
During pretend play, children need to what?
distinguish internal thoughts from reality, and may need to process two presentations simultaneously- reality and pretend.
When are children able to deceive adults by masking their emotional expressions?
3 years.
What were the results of the hidden treasure study (Chandler, Fritz, & Hala, 1989)?
Even 2.5 year olds engaged in various deceptive strategies such as wiping away footprints and laying false trails.
What are two possible explanations for the development of theory of mind?
- Develops from experiences with other people.
2. Develops alongside information processing abilities.
What three general categories are evident from infancy?
inanimate objects, animals, and people.
What did Ricard and Allard (1993) find in relation to the perception of people and other animals in infants?
showed animated toy, real rabbit, and an unfamiliar person. Behaved differently to each.
What was the key finding of perceptual categorisation study in toddlers by Landau et al. (1988)?
showed child a shape, changed the shape and asked child if it was the same shape. Texture and size change were accepted by shape changes were not. Showed between 2 and 3 years, children increasingly categorise objects by shape rather than size or texture.
When can infants perceive casual connections between physical events?
by 6 months
When can children take into account the probability of the object having a casual effect?
By 24 months.
What were the results of the “Blinket detector” test (Sobel and Kirkham (2006)?
The blanket detector plays music when the blanket is placed on it. After demonstration, children asked to turn it off themselves. 24 month olds could, 19 month olds could not.
Understanding concepts such as above, below, left of and right of develop when?
early infancy.
