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Title: How barriers become invisible: Children are less sensitive to constraints that are stable over time
Abstract
When making inferences about the mental lives of others (e.g., others’ preferences), it is critical to consider the extent to which the choices we observe are constrained. Prior research on the development of this tendency indicates a contradictory pattern: Children show remarkable sensitivity to constraints in traditional experimental paradigms, yet often fail to consider real‐world constraints and privilege inherent causes instead. We propose that one explanation for this discrepancy may be that real‐world constraints are often stable over time and lose their salience. The present research tested whether children (N = 133, 5‐ to 12‐year‐old mostly US children; 55% female, 45% male) becomelesssensitive to an actor's constraints after first observing two constrained actors (Stable condition) versus after first observing two actors in contexts with greater choice (Not Stable condition). We crossed thestabilityof the constraint with thetypeof constraint: either the constraint was deterministic such that there was only one option available (No Other Option constraint) or, in line with many real‐world constraints, the constraint was probabilistic such that therewasanother option, but it was difficult to access (Hard to Access constraint). Results indicated that children in the Stable condition became less sensitive to the probabilistic Hard to Access constraint across trials. Notably, we also found that children's sensitivity to constraints was enhanced in the Not Stable condition regardless of whether the constraint was probabilistic or deterministic. We discuss implications for children's sensitivity to real‐world constraints.
Research Highlights
This research addresses the apparent contradiction that children are sensitive to constraints in experimental paradigms but are ofteninsensitiveto constraints in the real world.
One explanation for this discrepancy is that constraints in the real world tend to be stable over time and may lose their salience.
When probabilistic constraints (i.e., when a second option is available but hard to access) are stable, children become de‐sensitized to constraints across trials.
First observing contexts with greater choice increases children's sensitivity to both probabilistic and deterministic constraints.
What is vision's role in driving early word production? To answer this, we assessed parent‐report vocabulary questionnaires administered to congenitally blind children (N = 40, Mean age = 24 months [R: 7–57 months]) and compared the size and contents of their productive vocabulary to those of a large normative sample of sighted children (N = 6574). We found that on average, blind children showed a roughly half‐year vocabulary delay relative to sighted children, amid considerable variability. However, the content of blind and sighted children's vocabulary was statistically indistinguishable in word length, part of speech, semantic category, concreteness, interactiveness, and perceptual modality. At a finer‐grained level, we also found that words’ perceptual properties intersect with children's perceptual abilities. Our findings suggest that while an absence of visual input may initially make vocabulary development more difficult, the content of the early productive vocabulary is largely resilient to differences in perceptual access.
Research Highlights
Infants and toddlers born blind (with no other diagnoses) show a 7.5 month productive vocabulary delay on average, with wide variability.
Across the studied age range (7–57 months), vocabulary delays widened with age.
Blind and sighted children's early vocabularies contain similar distributions of word lengths, parts of speech, semantic categories, and perceptual modalities.
Blind children (but not sighted children) were more likely to say visual words which could also be experienced through other senses.
Rawlings, Bruce S.; Davis, Helen Elizabeth; Anum, Adote; Burger, Oskar; Chen, Lydia; Morales, Juliet Carolina Castro; Dutra, Natalia; Dzabatou, Ardain; Dzokoto, Vivian; Erut, Alejandro; et al(
, Developmental Science)
Abstract
Recent decades have seen a rapid acceleration in global participation in formal education, due to worldwide initiatives aimed to provide school access to all children. Research in high income countries has shown that school quality indicators have a significant, positive impact on numeracy and literacy—skills required to participate in the increasingly globalized economy. Schools vary enormously in kind, resources, and teacher training around the world, however, and the validity of using diverse school quality measures in populations with diverse educational profiles remains unclear. First, we assessed whether children's numeracy and literacy performance across populations improves with age, as evidence of general school‐related learning effects. Next, we examined whether several school quality measures related to classroom experience and composition, and to educational resources, were correlated with one another. Finally, we examined whether they were associated with children's (4–12‐year‐olds,N = 889) numeracy and literacy performance in 10 culturally and geographically diverse populations which vary in historical engagement with formal schooling. Across populations, age was a strong positive predictor of academic achievement. Measures related to classroom experience and composition were correlated with one another, as were measures of access to educational resources and classroom experience and composition. The number of teachers per class and access to writing materials were key predictors of numeracy and literacy, while the number of students per classroom, often linked to academic achievement, was not. We discuss these results in the context of maximising children's learning environments and highlight study limitations to motivate future research.
RESEARCH HIGHLIGHTS
We examined the extent to which four measures of school quality were associated with one another, and whether they predicted children's academic achievement in 10 culturally and geographically diverse societies.
Across populations, measures related to classroom experience and composition were correlated with one another as were measures of access to educational resources to classroom experience and composition.
Age, the number of teachers per class, and access to writing materials were key predictors of academic achievement across populations.
Our data have implications for designing efficacious educational initiatives to improve school quality globally.
How do children learn about the structure of the social world? We tested whether children would extract patterns from an agent's social choices to make inferences about multiple groups’ relative social standing. In Experiment 1, 4‐ to 6‐year‐old children (N = 36; tested in Central New York) saw an agent and three groups (Group‐A,Group‐B, andGroup‐C) and observed the agent choose between pairs of individuals from different groups. Across pairwise selections, a pattern emerged: The agent chose individuals fromGroup‐A > Group‐B > Group‐C. Children tracked the agent's choices to predict thatGroup‐Awas “most‐preferred” and the “leader” and thatGroup‐Cwas “least‐preferred” and the “helper.” In Experiments 2 and 3, we examined children's reasoning about a more complex pattern involving four groups and tested a wider age range. In Experiment 2, 5‐ to 10‐year‐old children (N = 98; tested in Central New York) used the agent's pattern of pairwise choices to infer that the agent likedGroup‐A > Group‐B > Group‐C > Group‐Dand to make predictions about which groups were likely to be “leaders” and “helpers.” In Experiment 3, we found evidence for social specificity in children's reasoning: 5‐ to 10‐year‐old children (N = 96; from 26 US States) made inferences about groups’ relativesocialbut notphysicalpower from the agent's pattern of affiliative choices across the four groups. These findings showcase a mechanism through which children may learn about societal‐level hierarchies through the patterns they observe over time in people's group‐based social choices.
Research Highlights
Children in our sample extracted patterns from an agent's positive social choices between multiple groups to reason about groups’ relative social standing.
Children used the pattern of an agent's positive social choices to guide their reasoning about which groups were likely to be “leaders” and “helpers” in a fictional town.
The pattern that emerged in an agent's choices of friends shaped children's thinking about groups’ relativesocialbut notphysicalpower.
Children tracked social choices to reason about group‐based hierarchies at the individual level (which groups an agent prefers) and societal level (which groups are privileged).
Wealth‐based disparities in health care wherein the poor receive undertreatment in painful conditions are a prominent issue that requires immediate attention. Research with adults suggests that these disparities are partly rooted in stereotypes associating poor individuals with pain insensitivity. However, whether and how children consider a sufferer's wealth status in their pain perceptions remains unknown. The present work addressed this question by testing 4‐ to 9‐year‐olds from the US and China. In Study 1 (N = 108, 56 girls, 79% White), US participants saw rich and poor White children experiencing identical injuries and indicated who they thought felt more pain. Although 4‐ to 6‐year‐olds responded at chance, children aged seven and above attributed more pain to the poor than to the rich. Study 2 with a new sample of US children (N = 111, 56 girls, 69% White) extended this effect to judgments of White adults’ pain. Pain judgments also informed children's prosocial behaviors, leading them to provide medical resources to the poor. Studies 3 (N = 118, 59 girls, 100% Asian) and 4 (N = 80, 40 girls, 100% Asian) found that, when evaluating White and Asian people's suffering, Chinese children began to attribute more pain to the poor than to the rich earlier than US children. Thus, unlike US adults, US children and Chinese children recognize the poor's pain from early on. These findings add to our knowledge of group‐based beliefs about pain sensitivity and have broad implications on ways to promote equitable health care.
Research Highlights
Four studies examined whether 4‐ to 9‐year‐old children's pain perceptions were influenced by sufferers’ wealth status.
US children attributed more pain to White individuals of low wealth status than those of high wealth status by age seven.
Chinese children demonstrated an earlier tendency to attribute more pain to the poor (versus the rich) compared to US children.
Children's wealth‐based pain judgments underlied their tendency to provide healthcare resources to people of low wealth status.
The ability to engage in counterfactual thinking (reason about what elsecouldhave happened) is critical to learning, agency, and social evaluation. However, not much is known about how individual differences in counterfactual reasoning may play a role in children's social evaluations. In the current study, we investigate how prompting children to engage in counterfactual thinking about positive moral actions impacts children's social evaluations. Eighty‐seven 4‐8‐year‐olds were introduced to a character who engaged in a positive moral action (shared a sticker with a friend) and asked about whatelsethe character could have done with the sticker (counterfactual simulation). Children were asked to generate either a high number of counterfactuals (five alternative actions) or a low number of counterfactuals (one alternative action). Children were then asked a series of social evaluation questions contrasting that character with one who did not have a choice and had no alternatives (was told to give away the sticker to his friend). Results show that children who generatedselfishcounterfactuals were more likely to positively evaluate the character with choice than children who did not generate selfish counterfactuals, suggesting that generating counterfactuals most distant from the chosen action (prosociality) leads children to view prosocial actions more positively. We also found age‐related changes: as children got older, regardless of the type of counterfactuals generated, they were more likely to evaluate the character with choice more positively. These results highlight the importance of counterfactual reasoning in the development of moral evaluations.
Research Highlights
Older children were more likely to endorse agents whochooseto share over those who do not have a choice.
Children who were prompted to generate more counterfactuals were more likely to allocate resources to characters with choice.
Children who generated selfish counterfactuals more positively evaluated agents with choice.
Comparable to theories suggesting children punish willful transgressors more than accidental transgressors, we propose children also consider free will when making positive moral evaluations.
Amemiya, Jamie, Heyman, Gail D, and Walker, Caren M. How barriers become invisible: Children are less sensitive to constraints that are stable over time. Retrieved from https://par.nsf.gov/biblio/10538502. Developmental Science 27.4 Web. doi:10.1111/desc.13496.
Amemiya, Jamie, Heyman, Gail D, & Walker, Caren M. How barriers become invisible: Children are less sensitive to constraints that are stable over time. Developmental Science, 27 (4). Retrieved from https://par.nsf.gov/biblio/10538502. https://doi.org/10.1111/desc.13496
Amemiya, Jamie, Heyman, Gail D, and Walker, Caren M.
"How barriers become invisible: Children are less sensitive to constraints that are stable over time". Developmental Science 27 (4). Country unknown/Code not available: Wiley. https://doi.org/10.1111/desc.13496.https://par.nsf.gov/biblio/10538502.
@article{osti_10538502,
place = {Country unknown/Code not available},
title = {How barriers become invisible: Children are less sensitive to constraints that are stable over time},
url = {https://par.nsf.gov/biblio/10538502},
DOI = {10.1111/desc.13496},
abstractNote = {Abstract When making inferences about the mental lives of others (e.g., others’ preferences), it is critical to consider the extent to which the choices we observe are constrained. Prior research on the development of this tendency indicates a contradictory pattern: Children show remarkable sensitivity to constraints in traditional experimental paradigms, yet often fail to consider real‐world constraints and privilege inherent causes instead. We propose that one explanation for this discrepancy may be that real‐world constraints are often stable over time and lose their salience. The present research tested whether children (N = 133, 5‐ to 12‐year‐old mostly US children; 55% female, 45% male) becomelesssensitive to an actor's constraints after first observing two constrained actors (Stable condition) versus after first observing two actors in contexts with greater choice (Not Stable condition). We crossed thestabilityof the constraint with thetypeof constraint: either the constraint was deterministic such that there was only one option available (No Other Option constraint) or, in line with many real‐world constraints, the constraint was probabilistic such that therewasanother option, but it was difficult to access (Hard to Access constraint). Results indicated that children in the Stable condition became less sensitive to the probabilistic Hard to Access constraint across trials. Notably, we also found that children's sensitivity to constraints was enhanced in the Not Stable condition regardless of whether the constraint was probabilistic or deterministic. We discuss implications for children's sensitivity to real‐world constraints. Research HighlightsThis research addresses the apparent contradiction that children are sensitive to constraints in experimental paradigms but are ofteninsensitiveto constraints in the real world.One explanation for this discrepancy is that constraints in the real world tend to be stable over time and may lose their salience.When probabilistic constraints (i.e., when a second option is available but hard to access) are stable, children become de‐sensitized to constraints across trials.First observing contexts with greater choice increases children's sensitivity to both probabilistic and deterministic constraints.},
journal = {Developmental Science},
volume = {27},
number = {4},
publisher = {Wiley},
author = {Amemiya, Jamie and Heyman, Gail D and Walker, Caren M},
}
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