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- Title
Young Children's Understanding of the Interpersonal Functions of Apparent Crying.
- Authors
Mizokawa, Ai
- Abstract
This study examined children's expectations of the interpersonal consequences of apparent crying. Twenty-eight 4 year-olds and 32 5 year-olds were presented individually with four story tasks in the following design: 2 (crying: apparent, real) × 2 (condition: harm, harmless). The story protagonist seemed to cry in the apparent crying task, and actually cried in the real crying task. The protagonist expressed crying because he/she was harmed by another character in the harm condition, and was personally motivated to elicit another person's pro-social behavior in the harmless condition. Children were asked about the protagonist's crying and about the other character's feelings and behavior. The results showed that only 4 year-olds more often judged that apparent crying in the harm condition elicited another's pro-social behavior, compared with in the harmless condition. Five year-olds judged that when the apparent crying character felt sad or the apparent crying elicited another character's empathy, the apparent crying led to pro-social behavior. These findings suggest that there is a developmental change between ages 4 and 5 in understanding of the function of apparent crying.
- Subjects
CHILDREN; INTERPERSONAL relations; SOCIAL psychology; CRYING; NONVERBAL communication
- Publication
Japanese Journal of Developmental Psychology / Hattatsu Shinrigaku Kenkyū, 2011, Vol 22, Issue 1, p33
- ISSN
0915-9029
- Publication type
Article