TY - JOUR
T1 - The role of representational status and item complexity in parent-child conversations about pictures and objects
AU - Gelman, Susan A.
AU - Waxman, Sandra R.
AU - Kleinberg, Felicia
N1 - Funding Information:
This research was supported by NICHD grant HD-36043 to Gelman and NICHD grant HD-28730 to Waxman. We are grateful to all the children and parents who participated in this study. We also thank Aaron Anderson, Erin Boyle, Andrea Bullen, Julia Carpenter, Bethany Gorka, Kate Kozeliski, Brook McCloud, Rob Palazzo, Keli Rulf, Jenna Salm, and Colleen Thompson for research assistance, and Sarah Glauser for creating the drawings that were used in the studies.
PY - 2008/4
Y1 - 2008/4
N2 - Mother-child conversations about pictures systematically differ from mother-child conversations about objects: Pictures are more likely than objects to elicit talk about kinds, whereas objects are more likely than pictures to elicit talk about individuals. The purpose of the current study is to examine whether this difference between pictures and objects is explained by differences in item complexity. Mothers and their 4-year-old children were randomly assigned to one of two conditions: simple or complex. In each condition, participants viewed 12 toy objects and 12 pictures, matched for content. The items were either highly detailed (complex condition) or very plain (simple condition). Replicating previous research, mothers and children provided relatively more focus on kinds when talking about pictures, and relatively more focus on individuals when talking about objects. The current results go further, however, to demonstrate that this effect is independent of the items' complexity. We therefore propose that the picture-object difference is not due to low-level differences in amount of perceptual detail provided, but rather is due to the greater ease with which pictures serve as representations [DeLoache, J. S. (1991). Symbolic functioning in very young children: Understanding of pictures and models. Child Development, 62, 736-752]. These data indicate the ways in which a fundamental conceptual distinction between kinds and individuals arises in different linguistic expressions and in different contexts.
AB - Mother-child conversations about pictures systematically differ from mother-child conversations about objects: Pictures are more likely than objects to elicit talk about kinds, whereas objects are more likely than pictures to elicit talk about individuals. The purpose of the current study is to examine whether this difference between pictures and objects is explained by differences in item complexity. Mothers and their 4-year-old children were randomly assigned to one of two conditions: simple or complex. In each condition, participants viewed 12 toy objects and 12 pictures, matched for content. The items were either highly detailed (complex condition) or very plain (simple condition). Replicating previous research, mothers and children provided relatively more focus on kinds when talking about pictures, and relatively more focus on individuals when talking about objects. The current results go further, however, to demonstrate that this effect is independent of the items' complexity. We therefore propose that the picture-object difference is not due to low-level differences in amount of perceptual detail provided, but rather is due to the greater ease with which pictures serve as representations [DeLoache, J. S. (1991). Symbolic functioning in very young children: Understanding of pictures and models. Child Development, 62, 736-752]. These data indicate the ways in which a fundamental conceptual distinction between kinds and individuals arises in different linguistic expressions and in different contexts.
KW - Categorical reasoning
KW - Generic language
KW - Mother-child conversation
KW - Object representations
KW - Picture representations
KW - Preschool children
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U2 - 10.1016/j.cogdev.2008.03.001
DO - 10.1016/j.cogdev.2008.03.001
M3 - Article
C2 - 19122853
AN - SCOPUS:51749116287
VL - 23
SP - 313
EP - 323
JO - Cognitive Development
JF - Cognitive Development
SN - 0885-2014
IS - 2
ER -