Preschool Children's Difficulty Understanding the Types of Information Obtained through the Five Senses
Two studies explored 3- and 4-year-olds' (N = 60) understanding that the five senses can each lead to different types of knowledge. In Study 1, 40 children engaged in five scenarios in which they could only perform one sensory action to identify the property of an object (e. g., color, scent)....
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Published in | Child development Vol. 72; no. 3; pp. 803 - 815 |
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Main Authors | , |
Format | Journal Article |
Language | English |
Published |
Boston, USA and Oxford, UK
Blackwell Publishers Inc
01.05.2001
Blackwell Publishers Blackwell Blackwell Publishing Ltd |
Subjects | |
Online Access | Get full text |
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Summary: | Two studies explored 3- and 4-year-olds' (N = 60) understanding that the five senses can each lead to different types of knowledge. In Study 1, 40 children engaged in five scenarios in which they could only perform one sensory action to identify the property of an object (e. g., color, scent). After performing the action, children were asked how they found out the property and to show the experimenter how they had found it out. Using a Mr. Potato Head doll, children were also asked to indicate the sensory organ the doll would need to use to identify the property. In Study 2, 20 children presented with five Mr. Potato Head dolls, each sporting only one sensory organ (e. g., a nose), were asked which Mr. Potato Head could find out the property in question. The 3-year-olds performed significantly poorer than the 4-year-olds on all tasks, suggesting a marked transition in children's ability to recognize the origin of their modality-specific knowledge during the time period between 3 and 4 years of age. |
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Bibliography: | istex:2ACD19EFDE2EF9ED6C726B168B088B5B9BF59F7E ark:/67375/WNG-R1WBSP5J-W ArticleID:CDEV316 ObjectType-Article-2 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-1 content type line 23 ObjectType-Article-1 ObjectType-Feature-2 |
ISSN: | 0009-3920 1467-8624 |
DOI: | 10.1111/1467-8624.00316 |