Why Toddlers Don’t Do What They’re Told
Posted on April 6, 2009 Comments (2)
Why Toddlers Don’t Do What They’re Told
“I went into this study expecting a completely different set of findings,” said psychology professor Yuko Munakata at the University of Colorado at Boulder. “There is a lot of work in the field of cognitive development that focuses on how kids are basically little versions of adults trying to do the same things adults do, but they’re just not as good at it yet. What we show here is they are doing something completely different.”
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“If you just repeat something again and again that requires your young child to prepare for something in advance, that is not likely to be effective,” Munakata said. “What would be more effective would be to somehow try to trigger this reactive function. So don’t do something that requires them to plan ahead in their mind, but rather try to highlight the conflict that they are going to face. Perhaps you could say something like ‘I know you don’t want to take your coat now, but when you’re standing in the yard shivering later, remember that you can get your coat from your bedroom.”
Related: Kids Need Adventurous Play – Science to Preschoolers – Sarah, aged 3, Learns About Soap – Kids on Scientists: Before and After – Playing Dice and Children’s Numeracy
Categories: Research, Science, Students
Tags: experiment, kids, psychology, scientific inquiry, university research
2 Responses to “Why Toddlers Don’t Do What They’re Told”
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April 9th, 2009 @ 8:01 am
its primarily toddlers are fascinated with what they are seeing and sometimes its really hard to get their attention when their eyes are focus on those colors.
Toddlers are always fascinated with colors
April 22nd, 2009 @ 4:54 pm
Kids are not capable of thinking ahead unless it involves candy. Theres a better study.