Developing appreciation for ambivalence: The understanding of concurrent conflicting desires in 4- to 7-year-old children.

Abstract

The current experiment examined the development of children's ability to comprehend concurrent conflicting desires (i.e., both wanting and not wanting something at the same time). Participants were 4- to 7-year-old children and a group of undergraduate students (N = 20 in each age group). Results showed that the 6- and 7-year-old children understood concurrent conflicting desires at levels that were well above chance. There was evidence that even some of the 5-year-olds exhibited an emerging comprehension of conflicting desires. However, the 4-year-old children showed little ability to appreciate conflicting desire states. As such, children showed appreciation for conflicting desires at younger ages than suggested by previous research. In addition, significant relationships were observed between children's concurrent conflicting desire understanding and their theory of mind (ToM) and executive functioning (EF) skills, even after controlling for chronological and verbal age.

Preschool-aged children recognize ambivalence: emerging identification of concurrent conflicting desires

“…Second, and consistent with the results of Choe et al (2005) , Rostad and Pexman (2014) found that adults and 7-year-old children were able to correctly identify concurrent conflicting desire states in the “Conflict” condition (100 and 88% accuracy, respectively). However, the 6-year-olds in Rostad and Pexman (2014) also performed at significantly above-chance levels in the “Conflict” condition (83% accuracy), and the 5-year-olds were approaching above-chance levels (52% accuracy, in a task where chance was 33%). The 4-year-olds did not show accurate identification for desire states in the “Conflict” condition, and were significantly below chance in selecting the conflicting desire response option (13% accuracy).…”

“…The results of the Rostad and Pexman (2014) study showed, first, that children’s identification of conflicting desires was related to their theory of mind (second order false belief) and executive function (Dimensional Change Card Sort, DCCS, Zelazo, 2006 ) skills. Second, and consistent with the results of Choe et al (2005) , Rostad and Pexman (2014) found that adults and 7-year-old children were able to correctly identify concurrent conflicting desire states in the “Conflict” condition (100 and 88% accuracy, respectively). However, the 6-year-olds in Rostad and Pexman (2014) also performed at significantly above-chance levels in the “Conflict” condition (83% accuracy), and the 5-year-olds were approaching above-chance levels (52% accuracy, in a task where chance was 33%).…”

“…In a subsequent study, Rostad and Pexman (2014) directly assessed the relationship between children’s theory of mind skills and their ability to identify conflicting desires. In addition, Rostad and Pexman (2014) investigated whether, if children were given more insight about the speaker’s desires, concurrent conflicting desire identification could be found in even younger age groups. Child participants ranged in age from 4 to 7 years, and a group of adults were included for comparison.…”

“…It appears, therefore, that children as young as 6 years of age, and even some 5-year-olds, may be able to identify ambivalence and that the ability to identify ambivalence parallels development of theory of mind and executive function skills ( Rostad and Pexman, 2014 ). The current experiment was conducted to further examine this issue, and had two main goals.…”

How do thoughts, emotions, and decisions align? A new way to examine theory of mind during middle childhood and beyond

“…That 4- to 5-year-olds did not provide more valence-matched mental state triads or dyads for consistent-past versus inconsistent-past trials (as did individuals 6 years and older) further confirms that younger children have more difficulty identifying uncertain situations (Lagattuta & Sayfan, 2011, 2013; Lyons & Ghetti, 2011; Robinson et al, 2006). Potentially, this improved differentiation by past-experience type may also have been driven by growing awareness that some situations elicit mixed emotions (Gnepp & Klayman, 1992; Harris, 1983; Harter & Buddin, 1987; Lagattuta, 2005; Larsen, To, & Fireman, 2007), diverse thoughts (Lagattuta et al, 2010, 2014), and conflicting desires (Choe, Keil, & Bloom, 2005; Rostad & Pexman, 2014). …”