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Stopping at nothing : two-year-olds differentiate between interrupted and abandoned goals

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Green, Alexander, Siposova, Barbora, Kita, Sotaro and Michael, John (2021) Stopping at nothing : two-year-olds differentiate between interrupted and abandoned goals. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 209 . 105171. doi:10.1016/j.jecp.2021.105171 ISSN 0022-0965.

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Official URL: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jecp.2021.105171

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Abstract

Previous research has established that goal tracking emerges early in the first year of life and rapidly becomes increasingly sophisticated. However, it has not yet been shown whether young children continue to update their representations of others’ goals over time. The current study investigates this by probing young children’s (24-30 months old) ability to differentiate between goal directed actions that have been halted because the goal was interrupted, and because the goal was abandoned. To test whether children are sensitive to this distinction, we manipulated the experimenter’s reason for not completing a goal-directed action - his initial goal is either interrupted by an obstacle, or it is abandoned in favour of an alternative. We measure whether children’s helping behaviour is sensitive to the experimenter’s reason for not completing his goal-directed action by recording whether they complete the experimenter’s initial goal or the alternative goal. The results showed that children (n = 24) helped complete the experimenter’s initial goal significantly more often after this goal had been interrupted than after it had been abandoned. These results support the hypothesis that children continue to update their representations of others’ goals over time by the age of two, and specifically that they differentiate between abandoned and interrupted goals.

Item Type: Journal Article
Subjects: B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > B Philosophy (General)
B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > BF Psychology
Divisions: Faculty of Science, Engineering and Medicine > Science > Psychology
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH): Goal (Psychology), Child psychology, Social perception in children
Journal or Publication Title: Journal of Experimental Child Psychology
Publisher: Elsevier
ISSN: 0022-0965
Official Date: September 2021
Dates:
DateEvent
September 2021Published
4 May 2021Available
29 March 2021Accepted
Volume: 209
Article Number: 105171
DOI: 10.1016/j.jecp.2021.105171
Status: Peer Reviewed
Publication Status: Published
Access rights to Published version: Open Access (Creative Commons)
Date of first compliant deposit: 30 March 2021
Date of first compliant Open Access: 6 May 2021
RIOXX Funder/Project Grant:
Project/Grant IDRIOXX Funder NameFunder ID
679092European Research Councilhttp://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100000781
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