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Dai M, Gao Y, Hu X, Fu G, Hu Z, Sai L. Preschoolers' deception related to prefrontal cortex activation: An fNIRS study. Neuroimage 2024; 298:120795. [PMID: 39153522 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2024.120795] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/05/2024] [Revised: 08/05/2024] [Accepted: 08/14/2024] [Indexed: 08/19/2024] Open
Abstract
Deception is an essential part of children's moral development. Previous developmental studies have shown that children start to deceive at the age of 3 years, and as age increased to 5 years, almost all children were able to deceive for their own benefit. Although behavioral studies have indicated that the emergence and development of deception are related to cognitive abilities, their neural correlates remain poorly understood. Therefore, the present study examined the neural correlates underlying deception in preschool-aged children (N = 89, 44 % boys, age 3.13 to 5.96 years, Han Chinese) using functional near-infrared spectroscopy. A modified hide-and-seek paradigm was applied to elicit deceptive and truth-telling behaviors. The results showed that activation of bilateral dorsolateral prefrontal cortex was positively associated with the tendency to deceive an opponent in a competitive game in the 3-year-olds. In addition, 3-year-olds who showed a high tendency to deceive showed the same brain activation in the frontopolar area as 5-year-olds did when engaged in deception, whereas no such effect was found in 3-year-olds who never engaged in deception. These findings underscore the link between preschoolers' deception and prefrontal cortex function.
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Affiliation(s)
- Meng Dai
- Department of Psychology, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China; Zhejiang Philosophy and Social Science, Laboratory for Research in Early Development and Childcare, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China; Zhejiang Key Laboratory for Research in Assessment of Cognitive Impairments, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China; Department of Psychology, National University of Singapore, Singapore
| | - Yu Gao
- Department of Psychology, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China; Zhejiang Philosophy and Social Science, Laboratory for Research in Early Development and Childcare, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China; Zhejiang Key Laboratory for Research in Assessment of Cognitive Impairments, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China
| | - Xintai Hu
- Department of Psychology, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China; Zhejiang Philosophy and Social Science, Laboratory for Research in Early Development and Childcare, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China; Zhejiang Key Laboratory for Research in Assessment of Cognitive Impairments, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China
| | - Genyue Fu
- Department of Psychology, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China; Zhejiang Philosophy and Social Science, Laboratory for Research in Early Development and Childcare, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China; Zhejiang Key Laboratory for Research in Assessment of Cognitive Impairments, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China
| | - Zhishan Hu
- Shanghai Mental Health Center, Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, Shanghai, China.
| | - Liyang Sai
- Department of Psychology, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China; Zhejiang Philosophy and Social Science, Laboratory for Research in Early Development and Childcare, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China; Zhejiang Key Laboratory for Research in Assessment of Cognitive Impairments, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China.
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Zhang X, Wang S, Wang Y, Zhao Q, Shang S, Sai L. Other-Benefiting Lying Behavior in Preschool Children and Its Relation to Theory of Mind and Empathy. Behav Sci (Basel) 2023; 13:634. [PMID: 37622774 PMCID: PMC10451630 DOI: 10.3390/bs13080634] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/24/2023] [Revised: 07/27/2023] [Accepted: 07/28/2023] [Indexed: 08/26/2023] Open
Abstract
The present study examined children's lies to help others obtain benefits (other-benefiting lying) and its relation to theory of mind (ToM) and empathy among 3-5-year-old preschool children. One hundred nine children were recruited from preschools in China. A modified hide-and-seek paradigm was used to measure children's other-benefiting lying behavior, a ToM scale was used to measure children's ToM abilities, and an empathy scale was used to measure children's empathy abilities. Results showed that children tended to tell more lies to help other to get benefits as age increased, and further analyses showed that this other-benefiting lying was related to children's ToM component of false belief understanding and their cognitive empathy performance. These findings provide evidence that cognitive factors play important roles in children's lying to help others.
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Affiliation(s)
- Xiaoyan Zhang
- Department of Psychology, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou 311121, China
- Shengzhou Wuai Kindergarten, Shengzhou 312400, China
| | - Shenqinyi Wang
- Department of Psychology, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou 311121, China
| | - Ying Wang
- Department of Psychology, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou 311121, China
| | - Qiuming Zhao
- Department of Psychology, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou 311121, China
| | - Siyuan Shang
- Department of Psychology, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou 311121, China
| | - Liyang Sai
- Department of Psychology, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou 311121, China
- Zhejiang Philosophy and Social Science Laboratory for Research in Early Development and Childcare, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou 311121, China
- Zhejiang Key Laboratory for Research in Assessment of Cognitive Impairments, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou 311121, China
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Seucan DT, Szekely-Copîndean RD, Ding XP, Visu-Petra L. Give and take: A microgenetic study of preschoolers' deceptive and prosocial behavior in relation to their socio-cognitive development. Acta Psychol (Amst) 2022; 230:103714. [PMID: 36027708 DOI: 10.1016/j.actpsy.2022.103714] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/28/2022] [Revised: 08/12/2022] [Accepted: 08/16/2022] [Indexed: 11/01/2022] Open
Abstract
Early on, young children begin to learn the social skills which will help them navigate through an increasingly complex social world. We explored how deceiving for personal gain potentially interacts with sharing the resulting resources and how they both relate to theory of mind (ToM) and inhibitory control in 3- to 5-year-old children (N = 92, 43 girls). Children played a hide-and-seek zero-sum game in which they could win stickers if they discovered how to deceive the experimenter. Then they were prompted to share their stickers in a dictator game paradigm. Using a microgenetic design, we tracked deceptive behavior across ten sessions and sharing behavior across five of these sessions, plus a follow-up session 15 months later. Children polarized into a group who never deceived across all sessions, and a group who constantly deceived above chance levels (around 85 % of the time). Sharing behavior was extremely low (under 6 % of stickers) across the sessions. At follow-up, deceptive behavior was above 80 %, while sharing remained at a low level (under 5 %). The novelty of our findings was that children who initially discovered how to deceive shared less than the children who didn't use this deceptive strategy. Nonetheless, this pattern was reversed at follow-up. Furthermore, ToM positively predicted deceptive behavior across all sessions and improved after the microgenetic sessions but wasn't related with deception at follow-up. Implications for enabling children to deploy the growing understanding of their worlds in a more prosocial way are discussed.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Raluca Diana Szekely-Copîndean
- Department of Psychology, Babeș-Bolyai University, 400015 Cluj-Napoca, Romania; Department of Social and Human Research, Romanian Academy, 400015 Cluj-Napoca, Romania.
| | - Xiao Pan Ding
- Department of Psychology, National University of Singapore, 117570 Singapore, Singapore.
| | - Laura Visu-Petra
- Department of Psychology, Babeș-Bolyai University, 400015 Cluj-Napoca, Romania.
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Zhang Y, Mai X. 欺骗的认知神经网络模型. CHINESE SCIENCE BULLETIN-CHINESE 2022. [DOI: 10.1360/tb-2021-0963] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/09/2022]
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Zhao C, Shang S, Compton AM, Fu G, Sai L. A Longitudinal Study of the Relations Between Theory of Mind, Executive Function, and Lying in Children. Front Psychol 2021; 12:766891. [PMID: 34955986 PMCID: PMC8703068 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.766891] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/30/2021] [Accepted: 11/22/2021] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
This study used longitudinal cross-lagged modeling to examine the contribution of theory of mind (ToM), executive function (EF) to children’s lying development and of children’s lying to ToM and EF development. Ninety-seven Chinese children (initial Mage = 46 months, 47 boys) were tested three times approximately 4 months apart. Results showed that the diverse desire understanding and knowledge access understanding components of ToM, as well as the inhibitory control component of EF predicted the development of children’s lying, while the diverse belief understanding and false belief understanding components of ToM, and the working memory component of EF did not predict development of children’s lying. Meanwhile, children’s lying predicted development of children’s belief-emotion understanding components of ToM, but not any other ToM components, or EF components. These findings provide longitudinal evidence for the relation between ToM, EF, and children’s lying during the preschool years.
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Affiliation(s)
- Changzhi Zhao
- Department of Psychology, College of Education, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China.,Center for Cognition and Brain Disorders, The Affiliated Hospital of Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China
| | - Siyuan Shang
- Department of Psychology, College of Education, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China
| | - Alison M Compton
- Department of Psychology, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA, United States
| | - Genyue Fu
- Department of Psychology, College of Education, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China
| | - Liyang Sai
- Department of Psychology, College of Education, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China
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Sai L, Shang S, Tay C, Liu X, Sheng T, Fu G, Ding XP, Lee K. Theory of mind, executive function, and lying in children: a meta-analysis. Dev Sci 2021; 24:e13096. [PMID: 33544950 DOI: 10.1111/desc.13096] [Citation(s) in RCA: 25] [Impact Index Per Article: 8.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/29/2020] [Revised: 01/28/2021] [Accepted: 01/29/2021] [Indexed: 12/27/2022]
Abstract
Scientific research on how children learn to tell lies has existed for more than a century. Earlier studies mainly focused on moral, social, and situational factors contributing to the development of lying. Researchers have only begun to explore the cognitive correlations of children's lying in the last two decades. Cognitive theories suggest that theory of mind (ToM) and executive function (EF) should be closely related to the development of lying since lying is, in essence, ToM and EF in action. Yet, findings from empirical studies are mixed. To address this issue, the current meta-analysis reviewed all prior literature that examined the relations between children's lying and ToM and/or between children's lying and EF. In total, 47 papers consisting of 5099 participants between 2 and 19 years of age were included, which yielded 74 effect sizes for ToM and 94 effect sizes for EF. Statistically significant but relatively small effects were found between children's lying and ToM (r = .17) and between lying and EF (r = .13). Furthermore, EF's correlation with children's initial lies was significantly smaller than its correlation with children's ability to maintain lies. This comprehensive meta-analysis provides a clear picture of the associations between children's ToM/EF and their lying behavior and confirms that ToM and EF indeed play a positive role in children's lying and its development.
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Affiliation(s)
- Liyang Sai
- Institute of Psychological Sciences, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China
| | - Siyuan Shang
- Institute of Psychological Sciences, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China
| | - Cleo Tay
- Department of Psychology, National University of Singapore, Singapore
| | - Xingchen Liu
- Institute of Psychological Sciences, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China
| | - Tingwen Sheng
- Institute of Psychological Sciences, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China
| | - Genyue Fu
- Institute of Psychological Sciences, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China
| | - Xiao Pan Ding
- Department of Psychology, National University of Singapore, Singapore
| | - Kang Lee
- Department of Psychology, Zhejiang Normal University, Jinhua, China.,Dr. Eric Jackman Institute of Child Study, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
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