Development in Inferences of Ability and Task Difficulty

Abstract

SHAKLEE, HARRIET. Development in Inferences of Ability and Task Difficulty. CHILD DEVELOPMENT, 1976, 47, 1051-1057. The role of cognitive development in the formation of social judgments was investigated in 2 experiments examining children's use of task outcome information in attributional judgments of ability and task difficulty. In experiment 1, preschool, kindgergarten, and second-grade children were shown carnival game sequences of 4 trial outcomes and were asked to estimate either the player's ability or the difficulty of the task. While both ability and difficulty judgments were significantly influenced by task outcome at each grade level, age x outcome interactions indicated that judgment differentiation according to task outcome level increased with age. In experiment 2, preschool and kindergarten subjects viewed the same stimulus sequences. The experimenter summarized task outcomes after each 4-trial game sequence, then asked subjects to judge either the player's ability or the difficulty of the game. Children showed no increment in judgment differentiation in the outcome summary condition. Alternative explanations for these developmental trends are discussed.