Psychological Development and Education ›› 2010, Vol. 26 ›› Issue (3): 239-244.

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A Study on Self-reference Effect in Children aged 4 Years

ZHOU Ai-bao, LIU Pei-ru, SHI Zhan, ZHANG Peng-ying, WU Hui-fen, LI Qiong   

  1. School of Education, Northwest Normal University, Gansu, Lanzhou 730070
  • Online:2010-05-15 Published:2010-05-15

Abstract: We adopted two experiments to explore developmental trend of the self-reference effect and determine the age at which children begin to show the self-reference effect.One is a 3 (age:4,5 and 7 years old)×2 (cue:self-reference and other-reference) mixed design and 72 children participated; another is a 2 (age:3 and 4 years old) ×2 (cue:self-reference and other-reference) mixed design and 48 children participated.Each of the twelve object pictures was marked with sign which means the object belongs to "me" or "Li Ming",pictures were randomly presented sequentially,children were asked to report aloud"This is my ××" or "This is Li Ming's ××" according to the signs,then received the picture from the experimenter and placed the picture in a paper box which was marked with the corresponding sign,then presented the next one.Two minutes later,a surprised recall test was required.The results showed as follows:(1) there was significant difference among 4-,5-and 7-year-olds under the self-reference condition,but no difference was found under the other-reference condition; (2) the 4-year-olds recalled more than the 3-year-olds under the self-reference condition,and there was no difference under the other-reference condition.The results indicated 4-year-olds can show self-reference advantage,meanwhile,with the growth of age,recall rate demonstrated a developmental trend under the self-reference condition,which suggested the developmental characteristic of the self-reference in childhood.To date,the previous studies (Sui & Zhu,2005) which explored the development of the self-reference discovered the self-reference at 5 years old.We suggest that when tasks are suitable for children who are from at least 18 months old to 4 years old,SRE would emerge in these children,which is consisted with Marsh et al.(2002) who suggested that 18-month-old children can recognize themselves in mirrors.

Key words: self, SRE, ownership effect, infant

CLC Number: 

  • B844.1
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