EFFECT OF KNOWLEDGE ACCESS TRAINING ON CHILDREN'S STRATEGIC BEHAVIOR

Abstract

There is growing evidence that knowledge access mastery plays a role in the development of children's strategic behavior. However, there is still no direct evidence confirming the causal link between the two factors. The present study addressed this gap by investigating whether training children's knowledge access understanding significantly improves their strategic behavior. Three-year-old children were randomly assigned into two training conditions; children in the experimental condition were coached on their knowledge access understanding, while those in the control condition were taught to reason about physical concepts. Consistent with our hypothesis, children in the experimental condition demonstrated significant improvements in their strategic behavior following training relative to those in the control condition. The findings present empirical evidence supporting the causal role of knowledge access understanding in the emergence of strategic behavior and, more broadly, of ToM in the development of social competence among young children.