The Shared Toy and the Missing Word
A researcher studies sharing behaviour in 4-year-olds. In a playroom, each child is given four stickers and told another child (absent) will get none. The researcher measures how many stickers the child donates. In a second condition, the same children watch an adult model donate two of her four stickers before being asked to donate. Separately, the researcher tests 4-year-olds and 7-year-olds on a task where they must follow the rule 'put the red card where the blue card is' while the experimenter points to the wrong location. The 4-year-olds copy the experimenter's point; the 7-year-olds follow the stated rule.
1. Explain the difference between the 4-year-olds' and 7-year-olds' performance on the card task using a developmental account of executive function, and identify one alternative explanation the design has not ruled out.
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The card task requires holding a rule in mind while inhibiting a competing response (the experimenter's point) and switching between rule sets. On a standard account, these are executive functions - working memory, inhibition and cognitive flexibility - that develop markedly across early and middle childhood. The 4-year-olds follow the salient social cue (the point) because inhibitory control and rule maintenance are still immature; the 7-year-olds can keep the stated rule active and suppress the pointing response.
An alternative explanation not ruled out: the younger children may not have understood the rule, or may have interpreted the experimenter's point as a helpful instruction that overrides the spoken rule. That is a comprehension or social-pragmatic account, not an executive-function deficit. The design would need a control condition with no pointing, or a check that the child can state the rule, to separate these.
2. The researcher concludes that watching an adult model 'causes' increased sharing. Evaluate how strongly the sticker study supports this causal claim, and describe one design change that would strengthen it.
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The study compares donation after a model with donation without one, so it does establish a contrast. But it is weak on several counts for a causal claim.
First, order effects: if every child does the no-model condition first and the model condition second, any increase could be practice, familiarity with the task, or simply being older by the second session. Condition order must be counterbalanced.
Second, demand characteristics: the child may donate because an adult is watching and has just demonstrated the 'right' behaviour, not because sharing has been internalised. A measure taken later, without the adult present, would test whether the change persists.
Third, the sample is small and the measure is a single task; generalisation to real sharing is uncertain.
A design change that would strengthen the claim: randomly assign children to model or no-model conditions, counterbalance order, and include a delayed post-test with no adult present. If the model group still donates more later, the causal claim is much stronger.