%0 Journal Article %A Stengelin, Roman %A Ball, Rabea %A Maurits, Luke %A Kanngiesser, Patricia %A Haun, Daniel Benjamin Moritz %+ Department of Comparative Cultural Psychology, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Max Planck Society Department of Comparative Cultural Psychology, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Max Planck Society Department of Comparative Cultural Psychology, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Max Planck Society Department of Comparative Cultural Psychology, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Max Planck Society %T Children over‐imitate adults and peers more than puppets : %G eng %U https://hdl.handle.net/21.11116/0000-000A-D17C-F %R 10.1111/desc.13303 %D 2023 %* Review method: peer-reviewed %X Researchers commonly use puppets in development science. Amongst other things,
puppets are employed to reduce social hierarchies between child participants and
adult experimenters akin to peer interactions. However, it remains controversial
whether children treat puppets like real-world social partners in these settings.
This study investigated children’s imitation of causally irrelevant actions (i.e., over-
imitation) performed by puppet, adult, or child models. Seventy-two German children
(AgeRange =4.6–6.5 years; 36 girls) from urban, socioeconomically diverse backgrounds
observed a model retrieving stickers from reward containers. The model performed
causally irrelevant actions either in contact with the reward container or not. Children
were more likely to over-imitate adults’ and peers’ actions as compared to puppets’
actions. Across models, they copied contact actions more than no-contact actions.
While children imitate causally irrelevant actions from puppet models to some extent,
their social learning from puppets does not necessarily match their social learning from
real-world social agents, such as children or adults. %K over-imitation, peer interactions, puppetry, social learning, theory of puppets %J Developmental Science %V 26 %N 2 %] e13303 %@ 1363-755X1467-7687