2011 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

Young Children's Deception and Lying as indices of the Acquisition of Theory of Mind

Research Project

Project/Area Number	21530689
Research Category	Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
Allocation Type	Single-year Grants
Section	一般
Research Field	Educational psychology
Research Institution	Nara University of Education
Principal Investigator	URYU Yoshiko 奈良教育大学, 教育学部, 教授 (20259469)
Project Period (FY)	2009 – 2011
Keywords	幼児の認知発達 / 自我発達
Research Abstract	In this study the lower limit of the age of the acquisition of Theory-of-Mind was examined, by introducing a deception task with very familiar characters for young Japanese children, which was designed not to arouse their fear or hesitation. The results showed that even in this familiar situation, it was difficult for children under 4-year-old to deceive intentionally, which confirmed the former findings. Personality effect on the deception task was examined through logistic regression analysis, which showed not "independent" effect but "prudent" effect on the performance. These findings are discussed with regard to children's very early experience at home or away from home.