Narrative Access and Production in Preschoolers' False Belief Reasoning

Author(s): Freeman, N. H., Hagestadt, C., Douglas, H.

Journal/Book: Cognitive Develop. 1994; 9: 355 Chestnut St, Norwood, NJ 07648. Ablex Publ Corp. 397-424.

Abstract: False belief tests seem to show the apparent acquisition at around age 4 of an ability to understand the representational status of mind. In this article, preschoolers' performance on a false belief task was manipulated in terms of their grasp of its narrative base. Five experiments are reported in which 3-year-olds were helped to become familiar with the events that comprise the false belief procedure by going through a picture book version of the task, before being asked to judge the protagonist's mental state. In Experiment 1, children who had failed a traditional task succeeded if they narrated the book version back to the experimenter, particularly if they were fluent in their story recall. Experiment 2 showed that this success occurred either if the child recited the story or if she or he was taken through each page twice in succession. Experiment 3 combined the most effective procedures with a younger group of children (mean age 3;3) and revealed 95% success as long as they could recall the prerequisite events. Experiments 4 and 5 probed possible limiting conditions for success by inserting an extra episode in the story and changing the format of the test question. The results suggest that the structure of 3-year-olds' event memories is central to their poor performance in the traditional false belief task-a clear grasp of the false belief ''narrative'' is necessary for successful performance. When they are given the opportunity to link discrete events into a coherent narrative, they have no problem demonstrating an understanding of others' minds-being able to recount the narrative is sufficient for successful performance.

Note: Article C Lewis, Univ Lancaster, Dept Psychol, Lancaster 4A1 4YF, England

Keyword(s): CONCEPTUAL DEFICIT; KNOWLEDGE; MIND; COMPREHENSION; DIFFICULTY; IGNORANCE; MODEL; STORY

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