A cross-cultural investigation of young children's spontaneous invention of tool use behaviours

Royal Society Open Science
Karri NeldnerMark Nielsen

Abstract

Through the mechanisms of observation, imitation and teaching, young children readily pick up the tool using behaviours of their culture. However, little is known about the baseline abilities of children's tool use: what they might be capable of inventing on their own in the absence of socially provided information. It has been shown that children can spontaneously invent 11 of 12 candidate tool using behaviours observed within the foraging behaviours of wild non-human apes (Reindl et al. 2016 Proc. R. Soc. B283, 20152402. (doi:10.1098/rspb.2015.2402)). However, no investigations to date have examined how tool use invention in children might vary across cultural contexts. The current study investigated the levels of spontaneous tool use invention in 2- to 5-year-old children from San Bushmen communities in South Africa and children in a large city in Australia on the same 12 candidate problem-solving tasks. Children in both cultural contexts correctly invented all 12 candidate tool using behaviours, suggesting that these behaviours are within the general cognitive and physical capacities of human children and can be produced in the absence of direct social learning mechanisms such as teaching or observation. Children in both cu...Continue Reading

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Citations

Oct 24, 2020·Biology & Philosophy·Claudio TennieLydia M Hopper
Mar 30, 2021·Biological Reviews of the Cambridge Philosophical Society·Alba Motes-Rodrigo, Claudio Tennie
Apr 21, 2021·Cortex; a Journal Devoted to the Study of the Nervous System and Behavior·Michiel van Elk
Nov 24, 2020·Trends in Cognitive Sciences·Bruce Rawlings, Cristine H Legare
Aug 2, 2021·Infant Behavior & Development·Kristyn SommerMark Nielsen

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Software Mentioned

R package lme4
GATTeB

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