The Role of Intentionality and Iconicity in Children’s Developing Comprehension and Production of Cartographic Symbols

Abstract

The contribution of intentionality understanding to symbolic development was examined. Actors added colored dots to a map, displaying either symbolic or aesthetic intentions. In Study 1, most children (5-6 years) understood actors' intentions, but when asked which graphic would help find hidden objects, most selected the incorrect (aesthetic) one whose dot color matched referent color. On a similar task in Study 2, 5- and 6-year-olds systematically picked incorrectly, 9- and 10-year-olds picked correctly, and 7- and 8-year-olds showed mixed performance. When referent color matched neither symbolic nor aesthetic dot colors, children performed better overall, but only the oldest children universally selected the correct graphic and justified choices with intentionality. Results bear on theory of mind, symbolic understanding, and map understanding.

Reading a note, reading a mind: children’s notating skills and understanding of mind

“…For example, we did not administer some preliminary labeling tasks (see Browne & Woolley, 2001) and the child age range in our study was wider (3;3 to 6;2 rather than 3;11 to 5;3). Nonetheless, our intention-resemblance findings are supported by numerous studies indicating that even older children have difficulty reasoning about intentionality when it is not aligned with resemblance in tasks that involve producing and/or using symbols such as drawings, simple maps and 3D models (Liben & Downs, 1989;Myers & Liben, 2008; see also Bloom, 1996). The results of this study support the idea that, although preschool and kindergarten children have an understanding of mind, this ability continues to develop during the school years (Carpendale & Chandler, 1996;Lalonde & Chandler, 2002).…”

“…However, under certain conditions, even older preschoolers may have difficulty reasoning about mental states in the context of using symbols. For example, when the creator's intentions are pitted against the symbol's resemblance (e.g., a green dot represents a red fire truck), even 5-and 6-year-olds have trouble using information about the creator's mental states to choose the right graphic representation that could help a friend find a toy (Myers & Liben, 2008). Taken together, studies on symbolic development show that children's understanding of their own and other people's intentions, beliefs, and knowledge plays a role in the development of their ability to communicate information through symbols.…”

Graphic Symbols as “The Mind on Paper”: Links Between Children’s Interpretive Theory of Mind and Symbol Understanding

“…That is, the specific process of iToM is not a relevant one for communicating with abstract symbols. Instead, other aspects within the multifaceted construct of ToM (e.g., intention understanding; Myers & Liben, 2008) are relevant to abstract-symbol understanding. Additionally, in the current study, matrix reasoning emerged as a significant predictor of children's performance in the abstract (but not iconic) condition.…”

“…In addition to scoring children's maps to provide a quantitative score (as just described), we also scored children's map keys qualitatively, following and extending earlier coding systems for children's map keys (Myers & Liben, 2008). Specifically, keys were coded as being categorical (a single symbol paired with a single notation explaining its meaning), redundant (the same symbol-referent link was specified each time the symbol appeared on the map), modified (the symbols were changed by drawing or writing on them; e.g., turning an abstract symbol into a miniature picture of its referent), or global (the key broadly explained the meaning of the symbols but lacked specific information; e.g., ''the stickers mean toys'').…”

Taking the language stance in a material world

“…Most material structures lend themselves to several alternative meaning exploring interpretations (see, for example, Myers and Liben 2008), which consider attention and attunement to addresser's original intention crucial (see also Levinson 1979). for extensive references.…”