采用Keller,Gummerum,Wang和Lindsey(2004)的不知情义务推理范式,探讨了96名4、5、6岁幼儿对通过条件规则表述的鼓励性或禁止性的道德规则、以及习俗规则的义务推理能力的发展。结果表明:1)幼儿对两种不同领域规则的义务推理表现出基本一致的发展规律,表现出显著的“角色效应”,即多数幼儿都能指出同伴违反,随年龄增大指出妈妈违反、双违反的人次百分比逐渐增多,尤其是一些4岁幼儿就能正确指出道德和习俗领域中的妈妈违反,部分5岁幼儿即可正确指出双违反。2)在不知情的义务推理范式下,一些4岁幼儿错误指出本来是妈妈违反约定的情境中同伴违反、一些6岁幼儿错误指出本来是同伴违反约定的鼓励性规则情境中妈妈违反。3)尽管幼儿对道德和习俗规则的义务推理没有差异,他们对不同性质社会规则的义务推理却表现出显著差异。5、6岁幼儿对禁止性的道德规则中同伴违反的检测显著低于对鼓励性的道德规则,而6岁幼儿对双违反中妈妈违反的检测则相对更高;6岁幼儿对习俗规则的义务推理也表现出类似的不同性质之间的差异。这些结果在一定程度上突破了以往的研究结论,反映出幼儿对道德和习俗规则进行义务推理时表现出的跨领域的一般性及其领域内的特殊性。
Young children's deontic reasoning has been abundantly addressed by developmental psychologist since Wason Selection Task was simplified to explore the development of children's reasoning ability. It has been found that children around 2 to 3 years of age can make different judgments toward violations in moral and conventional domains. In the mean while, researches on children's Theory of Mind development also boomed. These studies, to some extent, all seemed to support the domain specific theory of children's cognitive development. In a recent research by Liu, Fang, & Keller (2003), children's deontic reasoning was explored in conditional promises between mom and her child such as, "if you dress yourself everyday this week, morn will take you to the zoo on Sunday". In their task with vignette, both mom and her child knew about the other's action before the contract was due. In Keller, Gummerum, Wang, & Lindsey (2004)'s study, however, both sides in the contract had no idea what the other was doing during the contract period. The ignorant deontic reasoning paradigm of Keller et al (2004) was deemed to be simpler in procedure and related to children's theory of mind development, thus was used in combination with the rule content of morality and social conventions, affirmative or inhibitive, to explore young children's deontic reasoning and have a tap on the domain specificity of children's cognitive development. Ninety-six 4-, 5-, and 6-year-olds (48 girls) were randomly selected from an ordinary kindergarten of Xuzhou, Jiangsu Province, who was organized into three age groups: 3-year-olds, Mean age =4.03; 4-year-olds, Mean age =4.93; 5-year-olds, Mean age =5.94. They were tested individually by telling stories accompanied by illustrations. Results show that: 1) Similar developmental trends and role effects were found in preschoolers' deontic reasoning of both moral rule and conventional rules, that is, most preschoolers can detect the peer (the child protago