Skip to Main Content
 

Global Search Box

 
 
 
 

Files

File List


osu1213021759.pdf (874.66 KB)

ETD Abstract Container

Abstract Header

Development of Generalization: What Changes?

Bulloch, Megan Jane
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1213021759

Abstract Details

2008, Doctor of Philosophy, Ohio State University, Psychology.
Development of reasoning is often depicted as involving increasing use of relational similarities and decreasing use of perceptual similarities ("the perceptual-to-relational shift"). I argue that this shift is a special case of a broader developmental trend: increasing sensitivity to the predictive accuracy of different similarity types. To test this hypothesis, young children were asked to label, to infer novel properties, and to project future appearances of a novel animal that varied in two opposite respects: (1) how much it looked like another animal whose name and properties were known, and (2) how much its parents looked like parents of another animal whose name and properties were known. When exemplar origins were known, children generalized to exemplars with similar origins rather than with similar appearances; when origins were unknown, children generalized to exemplars with similar appearances. Results support claims that young children can ignore salient perceptual information to generalize on the basis of non-obvious causal relations. In a further study, I asked participants (3-, 4-, 5-year-olds and adults) to generalize novel information on two types of problems: offspring problems, where, again, relational matches yield accurate generalizations, and prey problems, where perceptual matches yield accurate generalizations. On offspring problems, I replicated the previous findings of increasing relational matches with age. However, I observed decreasing relational matches on prey problems. Provided feedback on their responses, three-year-olds showed the same trend. In a final study, I looked at costs of task switching between the offspring and prey problems in young children and adults. Contrary to findings supporting the perceptual-to-relational shift, adults failed to inhibit incorrect perceptual matches but were well able to inhibit incorrect relational matches. Young children had difficulties inhibiting both incorrect perceptual matches and incorrect relational matches. It appears then that adults, and not children, are perceptually bound. Findings suggest that the relational shift commonly observed in categorization and analogical reasoning may reflect a general increase in children's sensitivity to cue validity rather than an overall preference to generalize over perceptual similarity.
John E. Opfer, PhD (Advisor)
Vladimir Sloutsky, PhD (Committee Member)
Laura Wagner, PhD (Committee Member)
91 p.
Psychology
generalization; development; relation; perceptual similarity; matching; cognitive

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Bulloch, M. J. (2008). Development of Generalization: What Changes? [Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1213021759

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Bulloch, Megan. Development of Generalization: What Changes? 2008. Ohio State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1213021759.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Bulloch, Megan. "Development of Generalization: What Changes?" Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University, 2008. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1213021759

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

osu1213021759
632
© 2008, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by The Ohio State University and OhioLINK.