Preschool Children's Conceptions Research Articles

The effect of Philosophy for Children (P4C) activities on the development of moral perception and social rules of preschool children

The purpose of the study was to examine the effects of P4C implementations on children's perceptions of moral and social rules. The study was carried out with a total of 48 children aged five years old, 23 of them in the experimental group and 25 of them in the control group, attending a public school in the 2023–2024 academic years. A quasi-experimental design was used in the research, and the fully mixed sequential equal status design, one of the mixed research typologies, was applied. The Preschool Children's Conceptions of Moral and Social Rules Scale was applied in the quantitative dimension of the research, and observation, interviews, and anecdotal records constituted the qualitative data collection dimension. Briefly, after the implementation process, the experimental group's perception of moral and social norms improved. In the current study, a substantial difference between the children's moral rule and social rule perceptions after the P4C sessions was discovered when the experimental group's moral rule and social rule perception scale scores were analyzed before and after the implementation. A noticeable improvement in cognitive and social-emotional development was seen. It was determined that positive behaviors improved, particularly in moral situations requiring tolerance, in the experimental group. The study came to the conclusion that teaching children philosophy helps them enhance their critical thinking skills.

Investigation of Moral and Social Rule Perceptions, Prosocial Behaviors and Emotion Regulation Skills of 60-72 Months-Old Children Attending Preschool Education Institution.

The present study was conducted with the aim of examining the relationships between the prosocial behaviors and emotion regulation skills of children aged 60-72 months attending pre-school educational institutions and their conceptions of moral and social rules. The sample group consists of 423 children (200 female and 223 male) aged 60-72 months and their families, selected among students attending kindergartens and pre-schools in Merkezefendi, Pamukkale, Tavas and Kale districts of the Denizli province using the Simple Random Cluster Sampling method in Turkiye. The "Preschool Children's Conceptions of Moral and Social Rules" scale was used to evaluate the conceptions of the children regarding moral and social rules while the "Prosocial Behavior Scale" and the "Emotion Regulation Checklist" were used to evaluate their prosocial behaviors and emotion regulation skills, respectively. The data were analyzed using the t-test and Pearson Product-Moment Correlation Coefficient (r) techniques. The study's findings revealed that a significant relationship between the variables of prosocial behaviors, emotion regulation and the conception of moral and social rules. The findings obtained from the analysis in this study were discussed within the scope of related studies in the literature and various suggestions were made for future studies within the framework of the conclusions reached.

Preschool children's conceptions about the electric current and the functioning of electric appliances

SUMMARY In this work we describe a research project with 38 preschool children, aged 5.5 to 6.5, aiming at the detection and study of children's ideas and conceptions about the functioning of common electric appliances, and about the electric current and its properties. The investigation was realised in preschool premises, with semi-structured personal interviews and with the help of 15–19 cards, each showing an electric appliance. The analysis of the answers showed that children of this age have no difficulty in recognising and naming the electric appliances they are familiar with. As regards to the electric current, they hold a variety of preconceptions. They represent electric current in quite a static way, they think that electricity is included into electric appliances, wires, plugs/wall sockets or the power grid's pylons. They confound electric current and water flow, they believe that electricity outdoors (‘external’) is completely different from electricity indoors (‘internal’), and they have not formed any idea for the provenance, flow or movement of electric current. In contrast, they know quite well the hazards provoked by electricity, in the case that one puts his/her fingers into sockets. Those data will be taken into account in order to conceive and realise a proper didactical intervention in preschool education, aiming at helping children construct certain valid preconceptions about electric current, which could subsequently evolute to conceptions valid from a scientific point of view.

Preschool Children's Conceptions of Disabilities

This research investigates the ways in which preschool children conceptualize different disabilities. Subjects were 46 children, 3 to 6 years of age, enrolled in inclusive preschool programs. Children were interviewed to learn their ideas about physical and sensory disabilities and Down syndrome, and to assess the salience of disability in their responses to photographs of unfamiliar children. Results revealed that most children were aware of physical disability, half of the children were aware of sensory disabilities, and no children expressed an awareness of Down syndrome. Children were sensitive to the effects of a physical disability on a child's motor performance, but were less aware of the consequences of other disabilities. These results have important implications for understanding typically developing children's reactions to, and ideas about, their classmates with disabilities in inclusive settings.

“Who's in charge?” Preschool children's concepts of authority

This study examined preschool children's concepts of authority with regard to three factors: adult/peer status, social position, and type of command. Sixty-seven children (ranging in age from 4 years; 0 months-6 years; 2 months) were asked to evaluate the legitimacy of commands of persons with varying age (peer/adult) and social position (with or without a delegated authority position), to give rationales for obedience, and to make choices between different persons giving opposing commands. Subjects accepted both peer and adult authorities and gave priority to peer authority over adult nonauthority, but did not extend the jurisdiction of authority to commands which failed to prevent harm. The findings show that preschoolers have understandings of the social context in which authority relations are embedded, conceptualizing authorities not solely with respect to their adult status, but to their role within the social context of the school.

Preschool Children's Concepts of Disability in Their Peers

Although mainstream preschool programs have been in existence since the 1970s, little is known about the ways in which typical children attempt to understand what it means for a peer to have a disability. In this study, 4-year-old children without disabilities who were enrolled in a mainstream preschool class explained their peers' disabilities by referring to concepts of immaturity, accident, or adaptive equipment to account for the behavioral differences that they observed. The implications of these cognitions for children's developing attitudes and behaviors toward peers with disabilities are discussed.

Preschool Children's Evolving Conceptions of Badness: A Longitudinal Study

The purpose of this research was to investigate longitudinally preschool children's conceptions of badness. Forty children from the Block and Block study of personality and cognitive development were interviewed at ages 3, 4, and 5 years. When asked to generate things children do that are "bad," preschoolers predominately generated events entailing negative consequences to others, that is, moral transgressions. They also mentioned events pertaining to conventional violations, emotional expressions, prudential situations, and punishments, but these were comparatively rare. The moral transgressions generated involved physical harm, property violations, and inter- personal trust violations. Physical harm was referred to significantly more often than the latter two moral categories. These findings were stable across the preschool years.

Preschool Children's Conceptions of Sex-Role Transgressions

SMETANA, JUDITH G. Preschool Children's Conceptions of Sex-Role Transgressions. CHILD DEVELOPMENT, 1986, 57, 862-871. The purpose of this research was to examine the conceptual basis of preschoolers' judgments regarding cross-gender behavior, taking into consideration the type of sexrole regularity and whether it is male or female sex-role stereotyped. 48 preschool children, 24 boys and 24 girls, reasoned and made judgments about counterstereotypical sex-role behaviors and appearances in comparison to judgments regarding moral and conventional transgressions. Sex-role transgressions were judged to be more flexible, permissible, and subject to subordinate jurisdiction than moral or conventional transgressions. Children were more strongly committed to the maintenance of male than female sex-role expectations and to female sex-typed appearances than activities. Boys also considered male cross-gender appearances more serious than male cross-gender activities. Children reasoned about sex-role violations as personal or conventional issues; male sex-role deviations were more likely to be seen as violations of social norms than were female sex-role deviations. Personal reasoning about sex roles was significantly correlated with greater flexibility and less commitment to sex-role expectations. Thus, young children were flexible but committed to sex-role expectations, and sex-role concepts were multifaceted, entailing different types of social concepts.

Preschool children's conceptions of transgressions: Effects of varying moral and conventional domain-related attributes.

Preschool children's conceptions of transgressions: Effects of varying moral and conventional domain-related attributes.

Preschool children's conceptions of transgressions: Effects of varying moral and conventional domain-related attributes.

Preschool children's conceptions of transgressions: Effects of varying moral and conventional domain-related attributes.

KNOWING ABOUT READING BEFORE READING: PRESCHOOL CHILDREN'S CONCEPTS OF READING

This paper reports findings from an investigation of preschool children's concepts about reading. Three tasks related to several basic ideas about reading were presented to 60 preschool children, ranging in age from three to five years. The first task assessed children's ability to identify oral and silent reading. The number of children who correctly identified both forms of reading increased with age, with almost all five‐year‐olds giving accurate responses. The second task was aimed at establishing children's perceptions of their own reading ability. Only four of the 60 children incorrectly evaluated their own reading ability. The third task investigated children's ability to recognize what it is on a page that is read. Three‐year‐olds were, on the whole, quite unaware of the salient information in books. Even among the five‐year‐olds, who performed significantly better than three‐ and four‐year‐olds on this task, some children's responses indicated an ambiguity about the role of print in reading. Sugg...

Preschool Children's Conceptions of Moral and Social Rules

SMETANA, JUDITH G. Preschool Children's Conceptions of Moral and Social Rules. CHILD DEVELOPMENT, 1981, 52, 13883-1336. This study examined preschool children's conceptions of moral and social-conventional rules. 44 children between the ages of 2-6 and 4-9 were divided into 2 groups of 21 and 23 children according to age (X = 3-3, 4-2). Children made judgments concerning the seriousness, rule contingency, rule relativism, and amount of deserved punishment for 10 (depicted) moral and conventional preschool transgressions. Analyses of variance with age and sex as between-group factors and domain as the within-group factor indicated that, constant across both sexes and the ages studied, children evaluated moral transgressions as more serious offenses and as more deserving of punishment than conventional transgressions. Moreover, moral events were less likely than conventional events to be regarded as contingent on the presence of a rule and relative to the social context. Test-retest reliability of the ratings of the seriousness of transgressions was .66 over a 2-3 week period. The findings were discussed in relation to the developmental differentiation model and the distinct conceptual domain approach.

Preschool Children's Conceptions of Moral and Social Rules

Preschool Children's Conceptions of Moral and Social Rules