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Preschoolers’ Motivation to Over‐Imitate Humans and Robots
Author(s) -
Schleihauf Hanna,
Hoehl Stefanie,
Tsvetkova Neli,
König Alexander,
Mombaur Katja,
Pauen Sabina
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
child development
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.103
H-Index - 257
eISSN - 1467-8624
pISSN - 0009-3920
DOI - 10.1111/cdev.13403
Subject(s) - imitation , psychology , humanoid robot , task (project management) , robot , cognitive psychology , theory of mind , developmental psychology , social psychology , cognition , artificial intelligence , computer science , neuroscience , management , economics
From preschool age, humans tend to imitate causally irrelevant actions—they over‐imitate. This study investigated whether children over‐imitate even when they know a more efficient task solution and whether they imitate irrelevant actions equally from a human compared to a robot model. Five‐to‐six‐year‐olds ( N = 107) watched either a robot or human retrieve a reward from a puzzle box. First a model demonstrated an inefficient (Trial 1), then an efficient (Trial 2), then again the inefficient strategy (Trial 3). Subsequent to each demonstration, children copied whichever strategy had been demonstrated regardless of whether the model was a human or a robot. Results indicate that over‐imitation can be socially motivated, and that humanoid robots and humans are equally likely to elicit this behavior.