Children's reports of the sources of self‐knowledge

Nursery schoolers and first‐ and third‐graders participated in an interview which assessed recall, comprehension, and perceived importance of three sources of self‐knowledge: social feedback, self‐observation, and social comparison. For recall measures, these sources were embedded in stories about a child making a self‐discovery. Recall of all three sources improved with grade level, and feedback was the best remembered self‐validational process. Comprehension was defined as the ability to identify the sources as depicted in line drawings, and it, too, increased with grade level. All three sources were well understood by older children, but preschoolers had difficulty with the concept of social comparison. Ratings of importance, also assessed using line drawings, were independent of grade level. When selecting their own “very best” source of self‐knowledge, children cited self‐observation most frequently. A supplementary sample of preschoolers nominated the best source of self‐knowledge for other children rather than for themselves; under these instructions, feedback from others emerged as the preferred source.