DEVELOPMENT OF SOCIAL COGNITION: SELMAN'S PERSPECTIVE-TAKING
Introduction
The social cognition refers to the concept of the child developing a sense of who they are and how they fit into society. This topic looks at how these mental mental processes come about and the factors that shape social cognition. Although there are many factors involved, we are focusing on the following 3 approaches:
Perspective taking
Theory of mind
Mirror-neuron theory
Selman's Levels of Perspective-Taking
Perspective-taking concerns the ability to assume another person's perspective and understand their thoughts and feelings. Being able to differentiate between people's perspectives and one's own enhance the understanding of other and oneself
Very young children don't understand that other people have different feelings and experiences from their own. But this perspective-taking ability develops over time until it's quite sophisticated in adults. Robert Selman, a psychoanalyst, developed a 5-stage model to describe the development of perspective-taking.
Selman's 5-Stage Model
Egocentric - Undifferentiated role-taking (3-6 yrs): Children recognise that the self and others can have different thoughts and feelings, but they frequently confuse the two.
Social-informational role-taking (6-8 yrs): Children understand that different perspectives may result because people have access to different information.
Self-reflective role taking (8-10 yrs): Children can 'step in another person's shoes' and view their own thoughts, feelings, and behaviour from the other person's perspective. They also recognise that others can do the same.
Mutual third-party role-taking (10-12 yrs): Children can step outside a two-person situation and imagine how the self and other are viewed from the point of view of a third, impartial party.
Societal and conventional system role-taking (12-15 yrs): Individuals understand that third-party perspective-taking can be influenced by one or more systems of larger societal values
As children mature, they take more information into account. They realise that different people can react differently to the same situation. They develop the ability to analyse the perspectives of several people involved in a situation from the viewpoint of an objective bystander, and they can even imagine how different cultural or social values would influence the perceptions of the bystander.
Selman's Research
Selman looked at changes that occured with age in children's response to scenarios. In these scenarios they were asked to take the role of different people in a social situation.
"Holly is an 8year old girl who likes to climb trees. She is the best tree climber in the neighbourhood. One day while climbing a tree she falls off the bottom branch but doesn't hurt herself. Her father sees her fall and is upset. He asks her to promise not to climb trees anymore, and Holly promises.
Later that day, Holly and her friends meet Sean. Sean's kitten is caught up in a tree and cannot get down. Something has to be done right away or the kitten may fall. Holly is the only one who climbs trees well enough to reach the kitten and get it down, but she remembers her promise to her father."
If children of different ages are presented with this situation and asked such questions as, 'If Holly climbs the tree, should she be punished?'
'Will her father understand if she climbs the tree?'
'Will Sean understand why Holly has trouble deciding what to do?'
The children gave answers relevant to their age group:
Egocentric - Undifferentiated role taking The child predicts that Holly will save the kitten because she doesn't want it to get hurt and believes that Holly's father will feel just as she does about her climbing the tree: 'Happy, he likes kittens'
Social-information role taking When asked how Holly's father will react when he finds out that she climbed the tree, the child responds, 'If he didn't know anything about the kitten, he would be angry. But if Holly shows him the kitten, he might change his mind.'
Self-reflective role taking When asked whether Holly thinks she will be punished, the child says, 'No. Holly knows that her father will understand why she climbed the tree' This response assumes that Holly's point of view is influenced by her father being able to 'step in her shoes' and understand why she saved the kitten
Mutual third party role taking When asked whether Holly should be punished, the child says, 'No because Holly thought it was important to save the kitten. But she also knows that her father told her not to climb the tree. So she'd only think she shouldn't be punished if she could get her father to understand why she had to climb the tree.' This response steps outside the immediate situation to view both Holly's and her father's perspectives simultaneously.
Societal and conventional system role taking When asked if Holly should be punished, the individual responds, 'No. The value of humane treatment of animals justifies Holly's action. Her father's appreciation of this value will lead him not to punish her.'
Supporting Research Evidence
Selman (1971) got 40 children aged 4 and 6 years to predict a child's behaviour after being given information about a situation that wasn't available to the child answering the question. The younger participants tended to make a prediction based on the information they had received. This suggests and egocentric viewpoint; supporting Selman's stage theory, as the children were still in the egocentric stage.
Selman and Bryne (1974) presented children aged between 4 and 10 with 2 interpersonal dilemmas and then, in interviews, got them to discuss the perspectives of different characters involved in each dilemma. Children aged 4 to 6 years tended to show evidence of having an egocentric viewpoint, perceiving things from their own perspective, whilst children aged between 6 and 8 years tended to show evidence of being in the social informational role-taking stage, understanding that people have different viewpoints, but were able to consider only one viewpoint at a time. Children aged 8-10 were increasingly able to see things from different perspectives. The results support Selman's theory, as they imply that perspective-taking increases with age in set stages.
Evaluation
Strength: Selman's theory has a practical application in physical education, as it has been used to ascertain the ages at which children can understand others' viewpoints and roles within competitive sports. There's little point in trying to teach team sports to children before they're less egocentric and can appreciate others' viewpoints.
Limitation: Selman's theory has been criticised for focusing too much on the effect of cognitive development on perspective taking and social cognition and downplaying the role of non-cognitive factors. For example, social factors such as arguments between friends have been seen to promote perspective-taking skills.
Strength: The developmental claims of Selman's model are supported by research evidence - individuals progress gradually to higher stages over time, with little evidence of any regression to lower stages.
Strength: Selman's use of interpersonal dilemmas has provided researchers with an objective means of assessing social competence that has become a paradigm (accepted) method of studying the development of perspective-taking.
Strength: Perspective-taking has practical applications as a means of conflict resolution.Walker and Selman (1998) used perspective-taking to reduce aggression levels by getting individuals to empathise with other peoples' feelings and viewpoints.