The Development of Future-Thinking Across Childhood

Session Type: Paper Symposium

Abstract

Children begin to anticipate future states around the ages of 2 to 3, and their ability to contemplate the future rapidly improves over childhood. The paper symposium aims to explore the development of future-thinking across the childhood years using different research approaches.

The first two papers address the early emergence of future-thinking. In Paper 1, parents reported that their 2- to 3-year-old children could demonstrate future-thinking skills (i.e., saving, delay of gratification, prospective memory, episodic foresight, and planning), but prospective memory and planning emerged more slowly. Paper 2 found that 3- to 4-year-old children could represent and prepare for the possible outcomes of future events in a behavioural task. The last two papers examine older children’s future-thinking using naturalistic approaches. Paper 3 found that 3- to 7-year-old children’s everyday future statements involved information seeking, future intentions/desires, future predictions, and plans. Paper 4 found that episodic details in 5- to 12-year-old children’s future event narratives increased with age, and children who successfully recalled the past also imagined the future better in a novel task.

Overall, although these studies adopted different research designs, they suggest that future thinking emerges in early childhood and improves with age. The symposium will synthesize their findings and contribute to the field by illustrating: (a) a timeline for the emergence and development of future-thinking skills in 2- to 12-year-olds and (b) the strong relation between episodic memory and future-thinking that supports the constructive episodic simulation hypothesis (Schacter & Addis, 2007).

Sub Unit

• Attention, Learning, Memory

Chair

• Ege Kamber, Brock University

Individual Presentations

• The Emergence of Future-Oriented Cognition in Toddlerhood: The Contribution of Cognitive and Language Abilities - Presenting Author: Ege Kamber, Brock University; Tessa Mazachowsky, Brock University; Caitlin E V Mahy

• Early Emergence of Reasoning About Multiple, Mutually Exclusive Possible Events and Objects - Presenting Author: Esra Nur Turan-Küçük, Boston University; Melissa M. Kibbe, Boston University

• A Naturalistic Investigation of Children’s Future-Oriented Behavior - Presenting Author: Gladys Ayson, University of Ottawa; Cristina Atance, University of Ottawa

• Imagined Movie “Sequels” Show Changes in the Composition of Episodic Future Thought During Middle- to Late-Childhood - Presenting Author: Christine A Coughlin, University of Texas at Austin; Anthony Dutcher, The University of Texas at Austin; Cameron E. Hall, University of Texas at Austin; Jeanne J. Gentot, University of Texas at Austin; Nicolette M. Notti, University of Texas at Austin; Andrei Amatoni, University of Texas at Austin; Alison Preston, University of Texas at Austin