University of California, Riverside | College of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences

We are currently running the following studies in and outside our lab.

Take a minute to see what we're working on!

 

Research on the effects of media and fantastical thinking on cognitive development

Research on religious concept development

 

Transferring from Fantasy

This research program explores whether fantasy has a facilitative effect on preschool children's ability to solve analogical problems.

In the first experiment, 3- to 5-year-old children were more likely to transfer a solution to a new problem if the stories were about fantasy characters rather than about their teachers. This was especially true for 3-year-old children. This mirrors other research demonstrating that framing cognitive problems in a fantasy context helps children to solve those problems. However, in the second experiment, 3- to 5-year-old children were more likely to transfer the solution from stories about their teachers to stories about fantasy characters, than vice versa. In the third experiment, 4- to 6-year-old children were asked to transfer the solution to novel games. The older children were more likely to transfer the solution to the novel games from stories about their teachers than from stories about the fantasy characters. The results of these experiments suggest that even though children's ability to solve analogies improved when the complete analogy was presented in a fantasy context, children demonstrated a greater ease in transferring solutions from reality to fantasy than from fantasy to reality.

Media Contingency Study

If children are more likely to transfer concepts from realistic contexts, this has direct implications to children's ability to learn and transfer from media.

Studies that examine children's learning from media generally do not address the influence of the context. Moreover, these studies often focus on children under the age of three, and the focus is primarily on the influence of screen media. The current study expands the scope of previous media investigations and explicitly addresses the influence of context on what older children learn and transfer from media. Analogy is used to examine the concepts that older children abstract from media.

In this study, preschool-aged children are exposed to one of three media platforms: storybook, video, or interactive (children watch the video while hearing the story from a live model). Additionally, some children receive the media and story in a fantastical context--with animation and epistemologically impossible events--while other children are shown an equivalent story in these mediums in a realistic context--with real people doing realistic things. The main aim of this investigation is to ask how children learn and transfer different kinds of information (physical information that requires the use of a tool, or a physical concept, and social information such as making friends or overcoming fear) from different media platforms and contexts.

Classroom Media Study

In an extension of the media congruency study, entire classrooms of preschool-aged children are exposed to the fantastical or realistic story or video. Learning and transfer is measured over time, as is often the case in educational settings. Additionally, children are given a test of cognitive ability and a brief Fantasy Orientation Interview. The primary aims of this research extends that of the media contingency study by examining the role of group settings in learning from media, as well as examining the impact of fantasy as an individual difference as well as a context.

Media Exposure Study

Recent years have seen an explosion in electronic media marketed directly at very young children; however, little is known about their interaction with media in the home environment.  The extent to which preschool children are exposed to television may play a significant role in their development and outcomes.  Thus, it is critical to understand and document young children's access to and use of electronic media in the home.  We are currently administering a survey to parents of children 0-6 asking about their home media environments that is representative of families in lower socioeconomic brackets, and minority populations including Hispanic/Latino and African American youth. . 

Baby Einstein Project - Children and the Media

The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommends that children under two years of age not be exposed to screen media, because of a presumed displacement relationship between viewing and time spent interacting with caregivers.  However, most of the research in the field has been related to children outside of this age range.  The 2003 study by the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF), Zero to Six: Electronic Media in the Lives of Infants, Toddlers, and Preschoolers, revealed that very young children are exposed to a variety of screen media, including television, DVDs, computers, and video games.  Despite the AAP's recommendation, the KFF study found that 68% of children under two use screen media, including 42% that watch videos and DVDs.  The study also found that these children spent an average of two hours and five minutes a day using screen media; 43% of all children surveyed watched television every day.

To date, there has been little systematic research on the effects of television on infants and toddlers.  Research in this field is increasingly timely, as videos and DVDs created specifically for this market have become a part of many parents' homes.  The KFF study reported that more than one in four children (27%) has seen one of the Baby Einstein videos or DVDs.   The Baby Einstein series is advertised as being appropriate for children starting at birth.

The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between infants' viewing of selected Baby Einstein videos/DVDs, and outcomes such as learning from DVDs, language acquisition, imitation, and problem solving.

The role of familiarity in learning from interactive media

This research is being conducted to expand our understanding of how children learn from interactive screen media. More specifically, this study will explore the effect of two possible influences on children’s interaction with and learning from an interactive toy: 1) parent support and 2) familiarity with the interface.

Religious Rituals

Children: It has been suggested that young children are cognitively equipped to ‘receive’ religious concepts. We have conducted two studies exploring whether children’s understanding of religious rituals capitalizes on default processes in action interpretation. In Experiment 1, children ages 5 to 11 were told stories about novel actions that were done for functional reasons or ritual reasons. There was an age difference in that the older children were more flexible than the younger children about the functional actions, and all children remained generally inflexible about the ritual actions. In Experiment 2, children ages 6 to 11 were asked about a familiar ritual, baptism, and a familiar functional action, a bath. In this case, children of all ages were far more inflexible about the ritual actions than the functional actions, especially when asked about the efficacy of those actions.

Adults: Two experiments were conducted to test the hypothesis that emotionally arousing ritual experiences promote rich and varied reflection on the meaning of ritual actions. In both experiments, participants performed a novel ritual that was designed to elicit either a strong or weak emotional reaction. Participants’ emotional reactions to the rituals were assessed both through biological methods (i.e., GSR) and self-report. In the first experiment, participants who reported a stronger emotional reaction to the ritual demonstrated greater volume and depth of reflection on the meaning of the ritual two-months later. In the second experiment, we found that participants who had a strong emotional reaction to a high arousal ritual demonstrated a greater increase in volume and depth of reflection on the ritual, as compared to participants who had a weak emotional reaction to a low arousal ritual. These findings suggest that both volume and depth of reflection on rituals vary with level of emotional arousal, and that it is the combination of high arousal ritual elements and a strong emotional reaction that results in deeper reflection on the ritual.

The Soul

We have conducted two experiments exploring whether children, who have been exposed to the concept of the soul, differentiate the soul from the mind. In the first experiment, 4- to 12-year-old children were asked about whether a religious ritual affects the mind, the brain, or the soul. The majority of the children claimed that only the soul was different after baptism. In a follow-up study, 6- to 12-year-old children were tested more explicitly on what factors differentiate the soul from the mind and the brain. Children differentiated the soul from the mind and the brain along two dimensions: function and stability. In contrast to their responses about the mind and the brain, children did not claim that the soul was important for cognitive, non-cognitive, or biological functioning. Children consistently indicated that the mind and the brain change and grow over time. In contrast, children indicated that the soul is something that stays constant and is devoted to various, predominantly spiritual, functions. We are now following up this research with adults to explore whether these distinctions exist in adults, whether they differ based on the religious and cultural backgrounds in which people are raised, and whether they influence ethical decisions.

Parents’ & Adolescents’ Beliefs

We are currently administering a survey to high-school-aged students. This survey is designed to explore whether adolescents’ beliefs in the afterlife, evolution, and the existence of God are the same as, or different from, those of their parents. In particular, we are exploring the effects of being raised in a home where parents differ from each other in their religious beliefs.