Learning Different Perspectives Makes Children Better Liars

Children's discoveries about belief also have consequences for other aspects of their relations to people. To deceive peopie, or to recognize that they are deceiving you, you need to be able to understand the differences between what they believe and what you believe. Doing that depends on understanding the way beliefs work. It depends on knowing what you have to do to make someone believe something that isn't actually true. Two- and three-year-olds are such terrible liars. they hardly qualif...

 Babies Don't Remember How They Learned Things

Alison has done other experiments that point in a similar direction. For example, three-year-olds seem to be unable to remember how they learned about something, even when the events took place only a few moments before. In one study the experimenter hid a cup under a cloth "tunnel," a wire arch covered with cloth, with an opening at either end. Children found out what was underneath the tunnel in one of three ways: they picked up the tunnel and saw the cup, they put their hands in the tunnel...

 When Babies Learn About Perspective

Alison and Andy designed an experiment to test this idea further. First they set up an imitation game: you give the toy to me and I'll give it to you; you put the sticker on my hand and I'll put it on your hand. Children are very good at this and love doing it. Then Alison and Andy put a screen on the table between the experimenter and the child. The experimenter hid a toy from the child by placing it on her side of the screen. Then she gave the toy to the child and asked him to hide it from ...