The Role of Inhibitory Processes in Young Children's Difficulties with Deception and False Belief

This research examines whether children's difficulties with deception and false belief arise from a lack of inhibitory control rather than from a conceptual deficit. In 3 studies, 3-year-olds deceived frequently under conditions requiring relatively low inhibitory control (e. g., misleading pic...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:	Child development 1998-06, Vol.69 (3), p.672-691
Main Authors:	Carlson, Stephanie M., Moses, Louis J., Hix, Hollie R.
Format:	Article
Language:	eng
Subjects:	Appearance Reality Distinction Biological and medical sciences Child Child Development Child, Preschool Children Cognition Cognition & reasoning Cognition and Language Cognitive Development Cognitive Processes Concept Formation Deception Developmental psychology Experimentation False Beliefs Female Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology Humans Inhibition Inhibition (Psychology) Inhibitory processes Lying Male Memory interference Mind Performance Factors Performance theory Preschool Children Problem Solving Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry Psychology. Psychophysiology Reality Testing Theory of Mind Toy boxes Toys
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Summary:	This research examines whether children's difficulties with deception and false belief arise from a lack of inhibitory control rather than from a conceptual deficit. In 3 studies, 3-year-olds deceived frequently under conditions requiring relatively low inhibitory control (e. g., misleading pictorial cues or arrows) but failed to do so under conditions of high inhibitory control (deceptive pointing). Study 2 ruled out that the findings were due to social intimidation: Children were equally successful using an arrow to deceive under anonymous and public conditions. Study 3 indicated that, under well-controlled conditions, children did not reveal greater understanding of false belief in deceptive than nondeceptive conditions. The results of these studies suggest that children may have greater deceptive abilities than some earlier studies indicated, and that the source of their difficulty on deceptive pointing tasks lies in a failure of inhibitory control. More generally, it is argued that children's performance on false belief tasks is also likely to be affected by inhibition deficits.
ISSN:	0009-3920 1467-8624