Social Interaction and Conceptual Capacities in Young Children's Category Learning

TAVERNA, ANDREA SABINA; PERALTA, OLGA ALICIA

Montreal - Quebec - Canada

Congreso; Society for Research on Child Development - Biennial Meeting 2011; 2011

Society for Research on Child Development

Most infants begin to form taxonomic systems when they acquire categories at basic levels (e.g. apple, dog). Later, children come to set their basic categories in relationship with higher-order ones forming the overarching superordinate concepts (e.g. food, animal, etc.). Recent studies examined the conceptual capacities which enhance children’s category understanding, such as comparison (Namy & Gentner, 2002) and inferential processes based on conceptual information (Booth & Waxman, 2005). Other research has also suggested that in order to refine their category understanding, young children might also need social and pragmatic support (Callanan; 1991; Nelson, 1985, 1996). In the present research we intended to show that it is social interaction in combination with young children’s conceptual capacities what drives category learning. We proposed that by making comparisons or conceptual-based inferences in a context of instruction, young children would be able to set basic-level objects in a supraordinate category. We tested this hypothesis in a pretest - posttest training study in which 3-year-olds´ performance was compared in two instruction conditions; comparison and conceptual-based, and in two control conditions; information-only and feedback-only. Both type of instructions consisted in socially mediated scaffolding processes in which an adult assessed children’s conceptual performance in the task and offered contingent category information and feedback, but differed in the kind of information provided. Sixty-five 3-year-old Spanish-speaking children from Argentina participated in this study, 24 girls and 32 boys (age range 2.7 to 3.5 years of age). We used a word extension and categorization task (Gentner & Namy, 1999) organized in 3 phases; pretest, training process and post-test.             The results revealed that children in the comparison condition selected more superordinate responses after training (82.4%) than in the pretest (11.8%), MacNemar p < .001, and so did children in the conceptual-based condition: posttest 81.3% vs. pretest 18.8%, MacNemar p < .002. In contrast, there was no significant increase in superordinate responses from pre- to post-test in the information-only condition (27.8% vs. 44.4%, MacNemar p = 0.3) or in the feedback-only condition (21.4% vs. 35.7%, MacNemar p = 0.5). Only the groups who received instruction exhibited in the posttest more superordinate responses than expected by chance (Figure 1). These results reflect that even though most children did not focus on superordinate categories in the pretest, those who were assessed for their  performance and received contingent category information and feedback were more likely to set basic-level objects in a superordinate category in the posttest. In contrast, children who received either only category information or only feedback did not succeed in relating the basic-level objects in a higher kind of conceptual relation. The results of this study provide an insight on concept and category learning as a result of the interplay between children´s conceptual capacities and social interaction with supportive adults. As Nelson (1996) proposed, cognitive development is characterized by a process in which children´s individual cognitive activity is as crucial as it is the interaction with the cultural, social and linguistic world.