The Effects of Attentional and Cognitive Factors on Children's Incidental Learning

Abstract

WHEELER, RICHARD J., and DUSEK, JEROME B. The Effects of Attentional and Cognitive Factors on Children's Incidental Learning. CHILD DEVELOPMENT, 1973, 44, 253-258. 24 boys and 24 girls at each of 3 grade levels (kindergarten, third, and fifth) were tested in an incidental-learning paradigm. For half the Ss, the central and incidental stimuli, line drawings of familiar animals and household objects, were spatially separated on the 8 stimulus cards; for half, the stimuli were contiguous. Half the Ss were instructed to label the central stimuli as the cards were exposed; half were not. Central learning increased with grade level but incidental learning remained constant. Spatial separation of central and incidental stimuli had no effect on central learning but had a decremental effect on incidental learning. Labeling of central stimuli had a facilitative effect on central learning and a detrimental effect on incidental learning. It was suggested that both spatial separation of stimuli and verbal labeling have attention-focusing effects but labeling aids encoding of the material as well. The results were discussed in terms of Neisser's theory of the development of selective attention.