Development of social roles in elicited and spontaneous behavior during the pre-school years

Abstract

In two experiments, children between ll/2 and 7l/2 years of age were tested on a predicted, eight-step sequence of the development of social roles. Performance on this sequence was related to two measures of more spontaneous behavior. Nearly all children fit the predicted sequence perfectly. By 2 years of age, most children could make a doll act as an independent agent. The majority of 3-year-olds could make a doll carry out several behaviors fitting the role of doctor. At age 4 or 5, most children developed the capacity to show a social role, making a doctor doll interact with a patient doll. The intersection of social roles for two agents appeared at about age 6: A man doll could be both doctor and father to a patient who was also his daughter. In their spontaneous behavior, early pre-schoolers almost always showed the highest step that they were capable of, but beginning with the step for social roles, late preschoolers seldom showed their highest step. For children to act and feel socially com-petent, they need to understand roles such as mother, father, doctor, and patient. Despite the importance of these social roles in the child's life, the development of social roles in the preschool years is, at best, only vaguely understood. The several previous studies of social-role development have concluded that children do not really under-stand social roles until 7 or 8 years of ag