Poster #7 - Young Children’s Monitoring of the Time and Source of Learning by Self or Other

• In Event: Poster Session 01

Abstract

Moments after learning a new fact, 4- and 5-year-olds often claim to have previously known it (e.g., Sutherland & Cimpian, 2015; Taylor et al., 1994). We examined this “knew-it-all-along” error by comparing children’s monitoring of their own knowledge with their tracking of another individual’s knowledge. If this error reflects difficulty monitoring metacognitive cues, children should make the error for judgments about their own knowledge, but not another person’s knowledge. However, if children have a more general difficulty relating knowledge to learning episodes, they should make the error for self and other.

In Experiment 1, 4- to 5-year-old children (N=32) participated in one of two conditions. In the Self condition, children learned 8 new animal facts (e.g.,“Chimps crack open kernels”), and judged whether they had known each fact previously or had learned it just now. In the Other condition, children and a puppet were taught a fact, and the children judged the puppet’s knowledge (Figure 1). Performance on judging the timing of when the fact was learned did not differ from chance in the Self or Other conditions (Table 1). Because children shared the puppet’s knowledge in the Other condition, children may have judged their own knowledge when asked about the puppet. In Experiment 2 (N = 32), in the Other condition only the puppet learned the facts while the children observed. As in Experiment 1, performance did not differ from chance in either the Self or Other condition (Table 1).

Experiment 3 compared time of learning judgments with source judgments. Children (N = 32) or a puppet learned a fact by either seeing a picture or being told. Children were asked both time and source (seeing vs. being told) questions. Performance again did not differ from chance for time questions in Self or Other conditions, but children performed above chance on source questions (Table 1). Thus, children showed some ability to monitor how learning occurred, but had difficulty judging when learning occurred. Experiment 4 compares judgments about when a fact was learned vs. when a picture was seen. If children’s difficulty is specific to tracking knowledge, then questions about when something was learned may be more challenging than questions about when an event, such as seeing, occurred. Data collection is in progress.

In Experiments 1-3, children made errors judging time of learning for both self and other. Thus, children appear to have a general difficulty tracking knowledge, rather than a metacognitive deficit specific to their own knowledge. Chance levels of performance indicate that errors were not a “knew-it-all-along” bias, but instead reflect uncertainty and random responding. These errors may reflect (a) limited conceptual understanding of learning, and (b) difficulty integrating diverse aspects of learning episodes (i.e., learned content, knowledge source, timing of learning) in memory.

Authors

• Bradford H Pillow, Northern Illinois University
  Presenting Author

• Martha E. Arterberry, Colby College

• Stephanie J. Cleary, Northern Illinois University