The Higher Structural Phases of Concept Formation of Children

Welch, Livingston; Long, Louis

doi:10.1080/00223980.1940.9917678

Cited by 37 publications

(23 citation statements)

References 1 publication

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…The studies reported here were designed specifically to determine whether young children apply familiar, hierarchically related labels to the same object. Two-and 3-year-old children were tested, because the Level I skill has been demonstrated to emerge by age 2, and previous studies suggest that the Level II skill may emerge in the 2-4-year age range (e.g., Anglin, 1977;Callanan & Markman, 1982;Macnamara, 1982;Welch & Long, 1940).…”

Section: Pamela Blewitt 1283mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Children in Study 1 were tested for the Level II skill with a selection task, similar in design to Welch and Long's (1940) identification task. From displays of four pictured objects, children were asked to select exemplars of a targeted superordinate label, and two included basic level labels.…”

Section: Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Two early studies provide examples of such tasks and of the disparate results that they produce. Using an identification task, Welch and Long (1940) asked 2-6-year-olds to identify the dogs in a display of many objects and, later, to identify liie animals in the same display. All of the 3-year-olds could perform satisfactorily on at least some word pairs.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…For example, Inhelder and Piaget (1964) considered "true" knowledge of hierarchies to be revealed only in the ability to recognize the quantitative implications of the inclusion relation inherent in hierarchies. They dismissed Welch and Long's (1940) findings as the result of children's parroting adult label use without understanding.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…At Level II, children may have their first knowledge of hierarchies, albeit implicit, in that they are able and willing to include the same objects into categories at different levels of generality. Tasks like Welch and Long's (1940) identification task are measures of this level of hierarchical skill. Although children at Level II will accept the multiple category membership of objects, they may not yet have derived any of the implications of multiple category membership, which is why their knowledge is described as implicit.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

See 4 more Smart Citations

Understanding Categorical Hierarchies: The Earliest Levels of Skill

Blewitt

1994

Child Development

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

2 categorization skills necessary for understanding hierarchies are the ability to form categories at different levels of generality and the ability to include the same objects into multiple categories. 2-year-olds appear to have the first skill, but some theoretical and empirical work suggests that the second may be a later acquisition. Yet, in 3 studies, 2-and 3-year-olds applied familiar basic level and superordinate labels to the same objects, even when reminded of basic labels before being tested with superordinates. They did not reserve superordinates for objects with unfamiliar basic level names (Study 2), and they were willing to apply superordinates to objects presented singly rather than in groups (Study 3). Thus, contrary to the implications of some previous work, 2-and 3-year-olds appear to have both of the categorization skills necessary for forming categorical hierarchies.

show abstract

Section: Pamela Blewitt 1283mentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

See 3 more Smart Citations