Children's Ownership Research Articles

Preliminary evidence for progressions in ownership reasoning over the preschool period.

Defining developmental progressions can be an important step in identifying developmental precursors and mechanisms of change, within and across areas of reasoning. In one exploratory study, we examine whether the development of children's thinking about ownership follows a systematic progression wherein some components emerge reliably before others. We examine this issue in a sample of 72 children: 40 older 2-year-olds, Mage = 2.78 (.14); R = 2.50-3.00, and 32 older 4-year-olds, Mage = 4.77 (.16); R = 4.50-5.00, living in Michigan in the United States. We use a battery of four established ownership tasks that tested different aspects of children's ownership thinking. A Guttman test revealed a reliable sequence that explained 81.9% of children's performance. Namely, we discovered that identifying familiar owned objects emerged first, control of permission as a cue to ownership second, understanding ownership transfers third, and the tracking of sets of identical objects last. This ordering suggests two foundational ownership abilities on which more complex reasoning may be built: the ability to include information about familiar owners in children's mental models of objects and recognizing that control is central to ownership. The observed progression is an important first step toward developing a formal ownership scale. This study paves the way for mapping the conceptual and information-processing demands (e.g., executive functioning, memory) that likely underlie change in ownership thinking across childhood. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

The Effect of Mother’s Mindset about Children Ownership on Stunting Prevention in Jember, Indonesia

The community's view of life and culture is determined by the language of the community itself, both in the form of language sounds and thought patterns, including the mindset about the perceived importance of ownership and nutritious food for infants/toddlers who are vulnerable to malnutrition and stunting (GBS). The problem is how young mothers think about the importance of child ownership and food for their babies/children and how it affects GBS. This is important to know because GBS babies are predicted not only because of economic factors, but because of their mindset. The purpose of this study is to reveal the mindset of mothers who have GBS babies about the perceived importance of child ownership and their toddler's daily diet. This research was conducted in Jember Regency which has a very high rate of GBS babies and maternal mortality. The data is in the form of words and sentences of young mothers about the perceived importance of having a baby/child and nutritious food. Sources of data from participants were young mothers with GBS babies, posyandu cadres, village officials, and community leaders. Collecting data using observation methods, in-depth interviews, and documentation with note-taking and recording techniques. After being classified, the data were analyzed using descriptive analytical, interpretation, and comparative approaches. The results show that the mindset of young mothers who have GBS babies is of the view that ownership of babies/children and nutritious food is very important. However, the fact is that they are still more concerned with nutritious food for their husbands and the purchase of valuable items so that it has an impact on the occurrence of GBS because children are not an asset, but as a deposit and a burden on the family. In conclusion, the mindset of mothers who consider babies/children as family assets affects the prevention of GBS (stunting) babies, starting from pregnancy, baby, and magnification

The Effect of Mother's Mindset about Children Ownership on Stunting Prevention in Jember, Indonesia

The Effect of Mother's Mindset about Children Ownership on Stunting Prevention in Jember, Indonesia

Screen Time and Autism: Current Situation and Risk Factors for Screen Time Among Pre-school Children With ASD.

Objective: To investigate the current status of screen time in children with ASD, its correlation with autistic symptoms and developmental quotient (DQ), and the factors affecting screen time.Method: One hundred ninety-three Chinese children with ASD were recruited. We collected the demographic and screen time data using a questionnaire. The ASD core symptoms and developmental quotient (DQ) were measured by the Autism Behavior Checklist (ABC), Childhood Autism Rating Scale (CARS), Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule-Second Edition (ADOS-2), Griffiths Development Scales-Chinese Language Edition (GDS-C), and Chinese Children's Parent-Child Relationship Questionnaire (CPCIS). Then, we analyzed the correlations between the screen time of children with ASD and the ABC, CARS, ADOS, GDS-C DQs, and CPCIS scores. Linear regression was used to analyze the risk factors that affect screen time.Results: The children's average daily screen time was 2.64 ± 2.24 h. Forty eight percent children were exposed to two or more types of electronic devices. Their favorite activity of screen time was watching cartoons. Only 34% children spent screen time accompanied by parents and with communication. 50.26% children had no screen time before sleeping. The screen time of children with ASD had a negative correlation with the GDS-C CQ (r = −0.234, P = 0.001) and the CPCIS score (r = −0.180, P = 0.012) and a positive correlation with the CARS score (r = 0.192, P = 0.009). A low father's education level (P = 0.010), less restriction of the child's screen time by the guardian (P = 0.001), greater caregiver screen time (P < 0.001), the use of the screen as a tool for child rearing (P = 0.001), and the child's ownership of independent electronic equipment (P = 0.027) are risk factors for long screen time in children with ASD.Conclusion: The screen time of children with ASD in China is higher than the recommended standard, and the current situation is serious. The screen time of ASD children is related to their autism symptoms, DQ and parent-child interaction. Low paternal education levels, less restriction of children's screen time by guardians, greater guardian screen time, the use of screens in child rearing, and children's ownership of independent electronic equipment can lead to an increase in children's screen time. These findings may have implications for family intervention strategies.

Unifying treatment for mild anxiety and depression in preadolescence.

Anxiety disorders in children and adolescents are prevalent and, if left untreated, can lead to comorbid psychological disorders, substance use, poor socioemotional functioning, and academic and occupational underachievement. Subthreshold presentations of anxiety in youth could become problematic if overlooked, resulting in the aforementioned negative outcomes. Thus, it is important to treat such presentations, including with evidence-based treatments such as cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT). However, because of not meeting the diagnostic criteria for which many CBT protocols were developed, subthreshold presentations of emotional problems could be an especially good match for transdiagnostic treatments like the Unified Protocol for Children (UP-C). Few studies have addressed this application of the UP-C to subthreshold emotion disorders; thus, this study aimed to preliminarily examine in a systemic case analysis (a) the efficacy of the UP-C for a preadolescent patient with mild anxiety/depression, and (b) the clinical utility of assessing both nomothetic and idiographic outcomes. Pre-post and time series outcome data demonstrated significant decreases in symptoms of depression, irritability, and negative reactions to events and significant increases in emotion identification and ownership of emotions. A network analysis of time series data described dynamics between parent and child ratings as well as the importance of child-rated anxiety and parent ratings of child's ownership of emotions. This case study provides evidence for the efficacy of the UP-C with a preadolescent who displayed subclinical symptoms of an emotional disorder. Furthermore, this case study demonstrates the usefulness of nomothetic and idiographic assessments for treating psychological disorders in youth. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

Parent-Child Discrepancies in Reports of Exposure to Violence/Pornography on Mobile Devices and the Impact on Children's Psychosocial Adjustment.

This study assessed the discrepancies between reports from parents and children concerning children's exposure to violence/pornography on mobile devices and the impact on the psychosocial adjustment of children. Data were obtained from a sample of 2,230 parent-child dyads recruited from 16 elementary schools (1,140 dyads) in Taiwan and 9 schools (1,090 dyads) in China. A self-administered questionnaire was used. The results showed that about 30 percent of children reported being exposed to violence on mobile devices. Approximately 70 percent of their parents were unaware of their child's exposure to violence on mobile devices. About 16 percent of children reported exposure to pornography on mobile devices, and 80 percent of their parents were unaware of this exposure. Multinomial logistic regression results showed that after controlling for parent and child sociodemographic variables, factors related to parental unawareness of child exposure to violence on mobile devices included a child's ownership of mobile devices, smartphone/tablet use time, a lower level of parental understanding, and a residence in China or in a rural area, whereas the parent-child relationship and a child's smartphone/tablet use time were associated with parents who were unaware of their child's exposure to pornography. Multiple regression results showed that children who were living with household poverty, had a poor parent-child relationship, spent much time using a smartphone/tablet, and with parents who were unaware of their exposure to violence/pornography on mobile devices were more likely to have emotional and behavioral problems.

Association between home environment and children's long hours of internet use: An analysis of Survey on Parent-child Relationship in the Internet Age

Objectives The purpose of this study was to investigate the association between home environment and long hours of internet use among Japanese elementary school and junior high school students.Methods We used data from the Survey on Parent-child Relationship in the Internet Age conducted by the Japanese National Institute for Youth Education in 2017. In the analysis, 2062 children between fifth grade of elementary school and second grade of junior high school from 20 prefectures in Japan were retained after excluding 210 children with no internet use. Exposure variables included children's ownership of internet devices (e.g., smartphones), parents' ways of using a mobile phone or smartphone at home, and the child's relationship to his or her parents. Outcomes were long hours of internet use on a weekday and a weekend day and experiencing a lack of sleep. We defined long hours as three or more hours on a weekday and five or more hours on a weekend day. Odds ratios (OR) and 95% confidence intervals (95%CI) were estimated using logistic regression analyses.Results Children's ownership of a smartphone or tablet was associated with long hours of internet use and experiencing lack of sleep. Compared to non-owners, adjusted odds ratios for smartphone owners were 2.55 [95%CI: 1.92-3.38] for long hours of internet use on a weekday and 1.66 [95%CI: 1.17-2.34] for lack of sleep. Spending long hours on the internet on the weekend was associated with parents using mobile phones while talking to their children [OR=1.59, 95%CI: 1.03-2.44] and children who do not enjoy being with family [OR=2.05, 95%CI: 1.00-4.18]. Additional analysis showed that situations such as parents' frequent use of mobile phones during talking, family members' frequent use of mobile phones even during family time, and not enjoying being with family were associated with not setting rules for children's use of mobile phones and personal computers at home.Conclusion Our findings suggest that factors such as ownership of devices and the ways parents use their mobile phones are associated with children's hours of internet use at home. To create an environment where children use internet appropriately, parental practices regarding mobile device use and rule setting at home may be important.

The role of age, theory of mind, and linguistic ability in children's understanding of ownership.

The current study replicates and expands prior work on children’s ownership intuitions and explores whether variability in theory of mind and linguistic ability predicts patterns in children’s understanding of ownership. We tested children ages 4 to 6 and found age-related differences in ownership intuitions, but those differences were not significantly predicted by variability in theory of mind or linguistic ability. This report is the first to specifically investigate the cognitive competencies that contribute to the development of mature ownership concepts, and to replicate many of the core findings in the literature.

Who Is the Rightful Owner? Young Children's Ownership Judgments in Different Transfer Contexts.

This study aimed to examine whether Chinese preschoolers understand that ownership can be transferred in different contexts. The study participants were 3- to 5-year-old Chinese children (n = 96) and adults (n = 34). With four scenarios that contained different transfer types (giving, stealing, losing, and abandoning), participants were asked four questions about ownership. The results indicated that preschoolers’ ability to distinguish legitimate ownership transfers from illegitimate ownership transfers improved with age. Three-year-olds understood that ownership cannot be transferred in a stealing context, but the appropriate understanding of ownership was not attained until 4 years old in a giving context and 5 years old in losing and abandoning contexts, which is similar to the adults’ performance. In addition to the first possessor bias (a tendency to judge the first possessor as the owner) found in previous studies, 3-year-olds also displayed a loan bias (a tendency to believe everything that is transferred should be returned) in the study. The findings suggest that the developmental trajectories of preschoolers’ understanding of ownership transfers varied across different contexts, which may relate to children’s ability to consider the role of intent in determining ownership and parents’ disciplinary behavior. Both cross-cultural similarities and differences are discussed.

Everyday Utopias: The Conceptual Life of Promising Spaces

Everyday Utopias: The Conceptual Life of Promising Spaces

You can’t always want what you get: Children's intuitions about ownership and desire

Ownership is a central element of human experience. The present experiments were designed to examine the influence of psychological state on ownership judgments. In three experiments, 4-year-olds were asked to make ownership attributions about owners and non-owners who either desired or did not desire a gift. Despite exhibiting a clear sensitivity to the desires of others, children made accurate ownership attributions independent of individuals’ desires. At the same time, there are subtle influences of desires on children's ownership judgments, as well as subtle influences of ownership on children's desire judgments. Thus, the two factors are largely but not wholly distinct in young children's thinking.

Young children's understanding of ownership rights for newly made objects

Young children often use simple rules of thumb to infer ownership of objects, but do they also understand ownership rights? We investigated whether 2- and 3-year-olds would react to violations of ownership rights in the context of newly made objects. In Experiment 1, children protested and made spontaneous reference to ownership when a puppet took away the child's object, but protested little when a third party's objects were at stake. Yet, 3-year-olds attributed ownership to the third party when asked ownership questions. Children's ownership claims were due to the effort invested in making new things, as they rarely used ownership protest after having handled raw materials (Experiment 2). Two- and 3-year-olds thus showed an appreciation of ownership rights for their own newly made objects. While 3-year-olds understood third party ownership, they may have lacked the motivation to intervene in ownership rights violations involving a third party.

Measuring challenge, fun and sterility on a ‘phunometre’ scale: evaluating creative teaching and learning with children and their student teachers in the primary school

‘It was the funnest week in the whole history of funnest weeks’: our case study, the second phase in a three-phase research project, evaluates the successes and limitations of creative teaching and learning during the ‘The Creative and Effective Curriculum’ module for PGCE primary student teachers which includes a one-week placement in school. Student teachers', children's and teachers' perspectives pointed to a range of factors necessary for effective and creative teaching and learning. These included learning which is ‘fun’, achievement through intrinsic motivation, willingness to take risks and learn from mistakes, children's ownership of learning and the teacher's role as facilitator. Our findings enabled us to formulate ‘phunometre scales’ which we suggest can be used to assess both the organisation of learning areas and also planned activities in terms of their capacity for learning which is both challenging and fun.

First Possession, History, and Young Children's Ownership Judgments

It is impossible to perceive who owns an object; this must be inferred. One way that children make such inferences is through a first possession bias--when two agents each use an object, children judge the object belongs to the one who used it first. Two experiments show that this bias does not result from children directly inferring ownership from first possession; the experiments instead support an alternative account according to which the first possession bias reflects children's historical reasoning. In Experiment 1, eighty-five 3- to 5-year-olds only based inferences on first possession when it was informative about the past. In Experiment 2, thirty-two 5-year-olds based ownership judgments on testimony about past contact, while disregarding testimony about future contact.

Enhancing participation in primary school and class councils through visual communication

In the context of citizenship education, many UK primary schools have recently set up school councils. Previous research has overlooked the importance of exploring communicative practices specific to school councils and the implications for children's participation. This paper draws on an action‐orientated research project with teachers in three Norfolk primary schools, which began with ethnographic observation of school and class council meetings. By developing alternative visual strategies for facilitating communication in meetings (based on a methodology known as PRA), teachers were able to encourage involvement by more children and enable them to have a greater voice in decision‐making. We argue that the common focus on adult procedures in school councils puts the emphasis on teaching children about their future role as citizens and can limit children's ownership of decision‐making processes. The alternative is to create contexts in which children have a sense of the democratic purposes of their school council in the here and now, by providing children with means (such as the visual strategies) that are consistent with those purposes and prioritizing action as an end.

Socioeconomic causes of child labor in urban Nigeria

Drawing on interviews with 1,535 children (aged 8–14 years) in urban Nigeria, this study introduces two new measures of child labor—child's ownership of business and control over earnings—to supplement the conventional use of a child's hours of work and to create a wider understanding of child labor. It examines the causes of child labor and how these measures vary by parental socioeconomic status. Study of this relationship is important for a deeper understanding of the varying patterns of child labor, as well as for clarifying the cultural and economic socialization of children. Our findings show that children of parents with higher socioeconomic status are more likely to own businesses rather than assist parents. These children are also more likely to keep and spend their work earnings. Our results also offer strong support of the poverty hypothesis and the socialization theory, which are often used to explain child labor in developing societies. Furthermore, our results indicate that children of paren...

Learning by Seeing by Doing: Arithmetic Word Problems

"Learning by doing" in pursuit of real-world goals has received much attention from education researchers but has been unevenly supported by mathematics education software at the elementary level, particularly as it involves arithmetic word problems. In this article, we give examples of doing-oriented tools that might promote children's ability to "see" significant abstract structures in mathematical situations. The reflection necessary for such seeing is motivated by activities and contexts that emphasize affective and social aspects. Natural language, as a representation already familiar to children, is key in these activities, both as a means of mathematical expression and as a link between situations and various abstract representations. These tools support children's ownership of a mathematical problem and its expression; remote sharing of problems and data; software interpretation of children's own word problems; play with dynamically linked representations with attention to children's prior connections; and systematic problem variation based on empirically determined level of difficulty.

Transitions to the Conventional: An Examination of a First Grader's Composing Process

A first grader's spontaneous utterances and actions while composing were audiotaped and observed for one school year. Data included both journal writing (self-sponsored) and writing assigned by the teacher. Seven shifts in composing process were identified, relating to his (a) use of resources, (b) focus and sharing, (c) revision process, (d) utilizing a stock of known words, (e) verbalizing while composing, (f) acquisition and application of case knowledge, and (g) control of spatial organization and serial order. Four factors that influenced these shifts were also identified: the pull of conventional forms, the social nature of composing, the importance of topic choice, and the role of the teacher. During the transitional period, a child's ownership of the process is set in a complex relationship with the teacher and peers as scaffold and the child's own increasing privileging of conventional forms.

Alternative perspectives on authentic learning environments in elementary science

There are multiple views of a learning environment, each having the potential to contribute to our understanding and valuing of learning. In this study, the teacher's view was positive, concerned with children's ownership of ideas and positive self esteem, and based primarily on a view that in order to learn, students need to be actively engaged in activities that are enjoyable and challenging. The researcher had two perspectives, both differing from the teacher's. Consistent with social constructivism the students interacted freely with one another, learned about structures, and produced models that reflected their goals. From this perspective the learning environment was rich. But there was something missing in this classroom — the utilization of resources to assist in reproducing the culture of science. From the perspective of cultural reproduction the learning environment was impoverished. Present approaches to the study of learning environments are grounded in a tradition of using questionnaires to elicit perceptions of the experiences and preferences of students and teachers in terms of constructs selected for their salience to researchers. Although these constructs have changed over the past 20 to 30 years to reflect theoretical models applied to the teaching and learning of science, the use of different methods and theories in the study of learning environments, particularly in elementary grades, offers the promise of improving the quality of learning and teaching science. Studies of elementary students undertaken by Roth and his colleagues in Canada (e.g., Roth, 1996) and Ritchie and Hampson (1996) in Australia are particularly relevant to this chapter. The studies have yielded implications for teaching and learning in terms of fresh theoretical perspectives based on the use of qualitative approaches to the study of learning environments in which technology was used to build ideas about canonical science. When Ms. Scott was first approached about participating in a study she agreed and suggested that building castles would provide a suitable context. Her grade 2 classroom was in an elementary school in the northern part of Florida and contained students from diverse socioeconomic backgrounds. The ethnic composition of the school was approximately 60% Caucasian and 25% African American with the remaining 15% consisting of Asian American and Hispanic students. Few students in grade 2 had limited English proficiency. The interpretative research methods used accessed multiple data sources and were responsive to experiences during intensive visits to the grade two classroom during a three week sequence of activities. Ms. Scott and her students were given multiple opportunities to discuss their roles in their own language. Artifacts from the classroom were collected and intensive analyses of videotapes and 35 mm photographs taken by the teacher were undertaken. This chapter is based on complementary perspectives which are presented in the next two sections. The first incorporates a narrative from Ms. Scott; the second is derived from the researcher's analysis and interpretation of data from the study.

Economic and political differentiation among Galole Orma women*

The Orma are cattle‐herders living close to Tana River in Kenya. This paper gives an outline of Orma propertyholding and of women's contributions to production in terms of labor. The relationship between control over resources (either outright ownership, rights over use, or indirect control through children's ownership) is discussed in relation to the influence women wield in issues considering sale of stock, decisions to shift or not, and the use of child labor. Formal and informal positions of power held by Orma women are analysed in relation to the effectiveness of women's influence over production decisions. The access that Orma women have to property varies with the degree of integration into the cash economy and to one's position on the nomadic‐sedentary continuum. With greater sedentarization and integration into cash economy women seem to lose control over economic resources in terms of outright ownership. They participate less in manual tasks of production. However, by a variety of informal and f...