Transfer in Young Children's Understanding of Spatial Representations

Abstract

The creative and flexible use of symbols is a unique human ability. In order to use a symbol, one must understand the basic relation between the symbol and what it represents. How do young children come to appreciate such relations? One possibility is that insight into one symbolic relation helps children appreciate different ones. The 3 studies presented here support this possibility. In Experiments 1 and 2, both 2.5- and 3.0-year-old children showed transfer from an easy task that required appreciation of a model-room symbolic relation to a more difficult one, one that children their age typically do not appreciate. In Experiment 3, 2.5-year-olds showed transfer between symbol types: Experience with a model-room relation helped them appreciate a map-room relation. These transfer effects are consistent with the claim that early experience with symbolic relations contributes to symbolic sensitivity, a basic readiness to recognize that one object or event may stand for another.

Core Knowledge of Geometry in an Amazonian Indigene Group

“…Further research is needed to establish to what extent this core knowledge is shared with other animal species (14,15) and whether it is available even in infancy or is acquired progressively during the first years of life (4, 10, 16-18). There is little doubt that geometrical knowledge can be substantially enriched by cultural inventions such as maps (19), mathematical tools (3,4,6), or the geometrical terms of language (18,(20)(21)(22)(23)(24)(25). Beneath this fringe of cultural variability, however, the spontaneous understanding of geometrical concepts and maps by this remote human community provides evidence that core geometrical knowledge, like basic arithmetic (7,26), is a universal constituent of the human mind (11).…”

Transfer by Very Young Children in the Symbolic Retrieval Task

“…One factor that has been hypothesized to make an important contribution to children's increasing ability to achieve representational insight with novel symbolic artifacts is their prior experience with symbols (DeLoache, 1995, 2002; Marzolf & DeLoache, 1994). It has been proposed that children's cumulative experience with a variety of symbolic artifacts (pictures, picture books, video, replica toys, and so on) contributes to the development of symbolic sensitivity—a general readiness or proclivity to interpret a novel entity primarily in terms of something other than itself (DeLoache, 1995, 2002).…”

Young children’s ability to use two-dimensional and three-dimensional symbols to show placements of body touches and hidden objects

“…However, DeLoache and colleagues have identified a number of conditions and parameters that moderate children’s symbol performance, including explicit verbal instructions on the task (DeLoache, 1989) and the degree of iconicity between the model and the room (DeLoache et al, 1991; Ganea et al, 2009). An additional finding from this lab is that, for their standard search tasks, children consistently show an appreciation of 2D symbols before 3D symbols (DeLoache, 1987, 1991; DeLoache & Burns, 1994; Marzolf & DeLoache, 1994). …”

“…First DeLoache and colleagues consistently have found that children’s ability to use symbols to guide their search for hidden objects undergoes rapid development between ages 2.5- and 3-years (DeLoache, 1987, 1991; DeLoache & Burns, 1994; Marzolf & DeLoache, 1994). Our findings identify a later age of competence in using symbols to demonstrate body touch.…”

“…The child must use the small-scale model as a symbol to gather information about where the larger doll is hiding in the “big room”. DeLoache and colleagues (e.g., DeLoache, 1987, 1991; DeLoache & Burns, 1994; Marzolf & DeLoache, 1994) consistently find that 2.5-year-olds have difficulty in using information from a scale model to guide their search of a larger room, but by age 3 most children succeed on the task. However, DeLoache and colleagues have identified a number of conditions and parameters that moderate children’s symbol performance, including explicit verbal instructions on the task (DeLoache, 1989) and the degree of iconicity between the model and the room (DeLoache et al, 1991; Ganea et al, 2009).…”