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Schulz D, Lenhard W, Mangold M, Schindler J, Richter T. Balancing accuracy and speed in the development of inhibitory control. J Exp Child Psychol 2024; 243:105915. [PMID: 38555697 DOI: 10.1016/j.jecp.2024.105915] [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: 10/03/2023] [Revised: 01/23/2024] [Accepted: 03/06/2024] [Indexed: 04/02/2024]
Abstract
Inhibitory control develops rapidly and nonlinearly, making its accurate assessment challenging. This research investigated the developmental dynamics of accuracy and response latency in inhibitory control assessment of 3- to 6-year-old children in a longitudinal study (N = 431; 212 girls; Mage = 4.86 years, SD = 0.99) and a cross-sectional study (N = 135; 71 girls; Mage = 4.24 years, SD = 0.61). We employed a computerized Stroop task to measure inhibitory control, with fluid intelligence serving as a covariate. A growth curve analysis revealed that children who reached an accuracy threshold of 80% earlier demonstrated faster improvements in response latency. Both the cross-sectional and longitudinal findings demonstrated a positive association between response latency in the inhibitory control task and fluid intelligence, but only when participants had achieved and maintained high accuracy. These results suggest that researchers should consider response latency as an indicator of inhibitory control only in children who manage to respond accurately in an inhibitory control task.
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Affiliation(s)
- Daniel Schulz
- Department of Psychology IV, University of Würzburg, 97070 Würzburg, Germany.
| | - Wolfgang Lenhard
- Department of Psychology IV, University of Würzburg, 97070 Würzburg, Germany
| | - Madlen Mangold
- Department of Psychology IV, University of Würzburg, 97070 Würzburg, Germany
| | - Julia Schindler
- Department of Psychology IV, University of Würzburg, 97070 Würzburg, Germany
| | - Tobias Richter
- Department of Psychology IV, University of Würzburg, 97070 Würzburg, Germany
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Moll H, Ni Q, Stekeler-Weithofer P. Ontogenetic steps of understanding beliefs: From practical to theoretical. PHILOSOPHICAL PSYCHOLOGY 2022. [DOI: 10.1080/09515089.2022.2073211] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/18/2022]
Affiliation(s)
- Henrike Moll
- Department of Psychology, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, United States
| | - Qianhui Ni
- Department of Psychology, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, United States
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Carroll DJ, Blakey E, Simpson A. Can We Boost Preschoolers' Inhibitory Performance Just by Changing the Way They Respond? Child Dev 2021; 92:2205-2212. [PMID: 34214196 DOI: 10.1111/cdev.13617] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/30/2022]
Abstract
Changing the way children make their response appears to sometimes, but not always, boost their inhibitory control-though interpreting existing findings is hampered by inconsistent methods and results. This study investigated the effects of delaying, and changing, the means of responding. Ninety-six preschoolers (Mage 46 months) completed tasks assessing inhibitory control, counterfactual reasoning, strategic reasoning, and false belief understanding. Children responded either immediately or after a delay, and either by pointing with their finger, or with a hand-held arrow. Delaying boosted performance on all tasks except false belief understanding; arrow-pointing only improved strategic reasoning. It is suggested that delay helps children work out the correct response; it is unlikely to help on tasks where this requirement is absent.
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Kälin S, Roebers CM. Time-Based Measures of Monitoring in Association With Executive Functions in Kindergarten Children. ZEITSCHRIFT FUR PSYCHOLOGIE-JOURNAL OF PSYCHOLOGY 2020. [DOI: 10.1027/2151-2604/a000422] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/23/2022]
Abstract
Abstract. Repeatedly, the notion has been put forward that metacognition (MC) and executive functions (EF) share common grounds, as both describe higher order cognitive processes and involve monitoring. However, only few studies addressed this issue empirically and so far their findings are rather inconsistent. Addressing the question whether measurement differences may in part be responsible for the mixed results, the current study included explicitly reported as well as time-based measures of metacognitive monitoring and related them to EF. A total of 202 children aged 4–6 years were assessed in terms of EF (inhibition, working memory, shifting) and monitoring. While there was no significant link between explicitly reported confidence and EF, latencies of monitoring judgments were significantly related to time- and accuracy-based measures of EF. Our findings support the association between EF and MC and the assumption that better inhibition abilities help children to engage in more thorough monitoring.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sonja Kälin
- Department of Psychology, University of Bern, Switzerland
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Low J, Edwards K. The curious case of adults’ interpretations of violation-of-expectation false belief scenarios. COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT 2018. [DOI: 10.1016/j.cogdev.2017.07.004] [Citation(s) in RCA: 11] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/27/2022]
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Baker ST, Leslie AM, Gallistel CR, Hood BM. Bayesian change-point analysis reveals developmental change in a classic theory of mind task. Cogn Psychol 2016; 91:124-149. [PMID: 27773367 DOI: 10.1016/j.cogpsych.2016.08.001] [Citation(s) in RCA: 9] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/04/2015] [Revised: 07/19/2016] [Accepted: 08/18/2016] [Indexed: 11/25/2022]
Abstract
Although learning and development reflect changes situated in an individual brain, most discussions of behavioral change are based on the evidence of group averages. Our reliance on group-averaged data creates a dilemma. On the one hand, we need to use traditional inferential statistics. On the other hand, group averages are highly ambiguous when we need to understand change in the individual; the average pattern of change may characterize all, some, or none of the individuals in the group. Here we present a new method for statistically characterizing developmental change in each individual child we study. Using false-belief tasks, fifty-two children in two cohorts were repeatedly tested for varying lengths of time between 3 and 5 years of age. Using a novel Bayesian change point analysis, we determined both the presence and-just as importantly-the absence of change in individual longitudinal cumulative records. Whenever the analysis supports a change conclusion, it identifies in that child's record the most likely point at which change occurred. Results show striking variability in patterns of change and stability across individual children. We then group the individuals by their various patterns of change or no change. The resulting patterns provide scarce support for sudden changes in competence and shed new light on the concepts of "passing" and "failing" in developmental studies.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sara T Baker
- Department of Psychology and Center for Cognitive Science, Rutgers University, 152 Frelinghuysen Road, Piscataway, NJ 08854, USA; School of Experimental Psychology, University of Bristol, 12a Priory Road, Bristol BS8 1TU, UK; Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge, 184 Hills Road, Cambridge CB2 8PQ, UK.
| | - Alan M Leslie
- Department of Psychology and Center for Cognitive Science, Rutgers University, 152 Frelinghuysen Road, Piscataway, NJ 08854, USA
| | - C R Gallistel
- Department of Psychology and Center for Cognitive Science, Rutgers University, 152 Frelinghuysen Road, Piscataway, NJ 08854, USA
| | - Bruce M Hood
- School of Experimental Psychology, University of Bristol, 12a Priory Road, Bristol BS8 1TU, UK
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9
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Abstract
This article reviews some of the recent work on the remarkable cognitive capacities of food-caching corvids. The focus will be on their ability to think about other minds and other times, and tool-using tests of physical problem solving. Research on developmental cognition suggests that young children do not pass similar tests until they are at least four years of age in the case of the social cognition experiments, and eight years of age in the case of the tasks that tap into physical cognition. This developmental trajectory seems surprising. Intuitively, one might have thought that the social and planning tasks required more complex forms of cognitive process, namely Mental Time Travel and Theory of Mind. Perhaps the fact that children pass these tasks earlier than the physical problem-solving tasks is a reflection of cultural influences. Future research will hope to identify these cognitive milestones by starting to develop tasks that might go some way towards understanding the mechanisms underlying these abilities in both children and corvids, to explore similarities and differences in their ways of thinking.
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Perner J, Roessler J. From infants' to children's appreciation of belief. Trends Cogn Sci 2012; 16:519-25. [PMID: 22964134 PMCID: PMC3460239 DOI: 10.1016/j.tics.2012.08.004] [Citation(s) in RCA: 164] [Impact Index Per Article: 13.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/21/2012] [Revised: 08/06/2012] [Accepted: 08/06/2012] [Indexed: 11/01/2022]
Abstract
Evidence is accumulating that infants are sensitive to people's false beliefs, whereas children pass the standard false belief test at around 4 years of age. Debate currently centres on the nature of early and late understanding. We defend the view that early sensitivity to false beliefs shown in 'online tasks' (where engagement with ongoing events reflects an expectation of what will happen without a judgement that it will happen) reflects implicit/unconscious social knowledge of lawful regularities. The traditional false belief task requires explicit consideration of the agent's subjective perspective on his reasons for action. This requires an intentional switch of perspectives not possible before 4 years of age as evidenced by correlations between the false belief task and many different perspective-taking tasks.
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Affiliation(s)
- Josef Perner
- Department of Psychology and Centre for Neurocognitive Research, University of Salzburg, Hellbrunnerstrasse 34, A-5020 Salzburg, Austria.
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Begeer S, Bernstein DM, van Wijhe J, Scheeren AM, Koot HM. A continuous false belief task reveals egocentric biases in children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorders. AUTISM : THE INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF RESEARCH AND PRACTICE 2012; 16:357-66. [PMID: 22399450 DOI: 10.1177/1362361311434545] [Citation(s) in RCA: 25] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/27/2022]
Abstract
This study reports on a new false belief measure in a sample of 124 children and adolescents with or without high functioning autism (HFASD). In the classic paradigm, a participant predicts in which of two discrete locations a deceived protagonist will look for an object. In the current Sandbox task, the object is buried and reburied in a sandbox, thus creating a continuum between locations. Compared to typically developing individuals (n=62), those with HFASD (n=62) showed a larger egocentric bias on the Sandbox task. They failed to take the protagonist's false belief into account, despite their adequate ability to infer advanced mental states. This indicates that sensitive measures can reveal subtle first order Theory of Mind impairments in HFASD individuals.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sander Begeer
- Vu University Amsterdam, the Netherlands and University of Sydney, Australia.
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Garner PW. Children's emotional responsiveness and sociomoral understanding and associations with mothers' and fathers' socialization practices. Infant Ment Health J 2012; 33:95-106. [DOI: 10.1002/imhj.20339] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/15/2023]
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Bernstein DM, Erdfelder E, Meltzoff AN, Peria W, Loftus GR. Hindsight bias from 3 to 95 years of age. J Exp Psychol Learn Mem Cogn 2011; 37:378-91. [PMID: 21299327 PMCID: PMC3084020 DOI: 10.1037/a0021971] [Citation(s) in RCA: 48] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/08/2022]
Abstract
Upon learning the outcome to a problem, people tend to believe that they knew it all along (hindsight bias). Here, we report the first study to trace the development of hindsight bias across the life span. One hundred ninety-four participants aged 3 to 95 years completed 3 tasks designed to measure visual and verbal hindsight bias. All age groups demonstrated hindsight bias on all 3 tasks; however, preschoolers and older adults exhibited more bias than older children and younger adults. Multinomial processing tree analyses of these data revealed that preschoolers' enhanced hindsight bias resulted from them substituting the correct answer for their original answer in their recall (a qualitative error). Conversely, older adults' enhanced hindsight bias resulted from them forgetting their original answer and recalling an answer closer to, but not equal to, the correct answer (a quantitative error). We discuss these findings in relation to mechanisms of memory, perspective taking, theory of mind, and executive function.
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Affiliation(s)
- Daniel M Bernstein
- Department of Psychology, Kwantlen Polytechnic University, 12666-72nd Avenue, Surrey, British Columbia, V3W 2M8 Canada.
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