Premium
To be or not to be a galaprock: Preschoolers' intuitions about the importance of knowledge and action for pretending
Author(s) -
Gottfried Gail M.,
Hickling Anne K.,
Totten Leah R.,
Mkroyan Alice,
Reisz Amber
Publication year - 2003
Publication title -
british journal of developmental psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.062
H-Index - 75
eISSN - 2044-835X
pISSN - 0261-510X
DOI - 10.1348/026151003322277775
Subject(s) - psychology , ignorance , action (physics) , object (grammar) , comprehension , cognition , developmental psychology , cognitive psychology , social psychology , epistemology , linguistics , physics , quantum mechanics , neuroscience , philosophy
Can someone pretend to be a galaprock without knowing what a galaprock is? Do children recognize that such knowledge is required for pretending? Three studies focusing on the relations among action, knowledge and pretending suggest that children have this understanding by age 4 years. In Study 1, 4‐year‐olds and adults willingly pretended to be moving and unmoving objects but had trouble pretending to be objects that were difficult to represent physically. In Study 2, 3‐ and 4‐year‐olds claimed they could not pretend to be an unknown thing, justifying their refusals with mentalistic language indicating their ignorance of the object or its typical actions. In Study 3, 3‐ to 5‐year‐olds predicted that other children who have knowledge of an object unfamiliar to the subjects themselves can nevertheless pretend to be it, whereas those lacking that knowledge cannot. The results add support to the growing literature showing that preschoolers conceptualize pretense as involving mental activity.