Japanese children's development of false belief understanding.
Two studies were conducted to examine the Japanese children's false belief understanding. Study 1, a small-scale meta-analysis that included 21 Japanese false belief studies yielding 60 data points, revealed that the Japanese children's false belief understanding develops with age (effect size = 2.48 in odds ratio for 1 year), the Japanese children's performance exceeds the chance level at the age of 64 months, and question type (think vs look-for) produced no statistically significant difference. An experiment (Study 2) employing a change-of-locations task was conducted to confirm these findings, manipulating question type as a within-participant factor. Participants were 43 Japanese kindergartners (24 boys and 19 girls; 3 yr. 4 mo. to 6 yr. 1 mo.). The results showed that Japanese children's false belief performance developed with age. Their performance level exceeded the chance level at the age of 5 years, and question type did not affect their performance.
Ohtsubo
Yohsuke
Y
Department of Psychology, Faculty of Sociology, Nara University, 1500 Misasagi-cho, Nara, 631-8502, Japan. ohtsubo@daibutsu.nara-u.ac.jp
D044466:Asian People; D002657:Child Development; D002675:Child, Preschool; D003071:Cognition; D003469:Culture; D008192:Deception; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male