Abstract

During the second year of life, children's social-cognitive competence shows a dramatic increase. They begin (a) to recognize themselves in mirrors (Lewis & Brooks-Gunn, 1979), (b) to react self-consciously when in the center of others' attention (Lewis, Sullivan, Stanger, & Weiss, 1989), (c) to react with empathic behavior to victims of distress (Zahn-Waxier, RadkeYarrow, & King, 1979), (d) to communicate with peers preverbally through the synchronic imitation of each other's activity (Nadel-Brulfert & Baudonniere, 1982), and (e) to cooperate with peers (Brownell&Carriger, 1990). We (Asendorpf & Baudonniere, 1993) have attempted to integrate these findings within a social-cognitive framework. The five rapidly developing abilities are instances of two particular kinds of cognition: self-awareness (self-recognition ability) and other-awareness (self-consciousness, empathy, communication through synchronic imitation, and cooperation). We have proposed that these two kinds of cognition develop in close synchrony during the second year because both types of cognition are based on one common cognitive capacity: the capacity for secondary representation.

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