Treating Another's Actions as One's Own: Children's Memory of and Learning from Joint Activity

• Published in: Developmental psychology Vol. 43; no. 4; pp. 1003 - 1018
• Main Authors: Sommerville, Jessica A, Hammond, Amy J
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States American Psychological Association 01.07.2007
• Subjects: Bias; Child Development; Child, Preschool; Children; Cooperation; Cooperative Behavior; Design; Female; Group Activities; Humans; Individual Power; Interpersonal Relations; Learning; Learning Activities; Locus of Control; Male; Memory; Mental Recall; Self Concept; Self Efficacy; Social Behavior; Videotape Recording
• ISSN: 0012-1649
• DOI: 10.1037/0012-1649.43.4.1003

Children often overestimate their contribution to collaborative activities. Across 2 studies, the authors investigated whether this memory bias supports internalization of the actions of others in the context of joint exchanges. After taking turns with (high collaborative condition; Studies 1 and 2) or working independently of (low collaborative condition; Study 2) an adult experimenter to create a series of novel toys, children's agent memory and reconstruction ability were assessed. Children in the high collaborative condition but not the low collaborative condition systematically overclaimed the actions of their social partner, more frequently reporting having completed steps performed by the experimenter than vice versa. This "I did it" bias was related to learning performance: high collaborative children outperformed low collaborative children both during an immediate reconstruction task and 4 months later, and the strength of the bias predicted children's independent toy-building accuracy. It is argued that the "I did it" bias may emerge as part of a general process of learning from others and is supported by a common framework for representing self-actions and other actions.