Plousia Misailidi

Introduction: The Present and the Future in Metacognition

The introduction to the edited book entitled Trends and Prospects in Metacognition Research is also a discussion of major issues that pervade current research in metacognition. These issues are at the background of the chapters of the book and set the stage for the identification of prospects for future research and theory in metacognition. Specifically, the introduction provides a brief description of the content of each chapter following the book’s organization in two parts: the first focusing on basic research in metacognition and the second on the developments and applications of metacognition in education. Then, the theoretical convergences and divergences between the chapters are discussed. The theoretical issues underlying the various chapters concern (a) the importance of uncertainty monitoring, (b) the nonconscious versus conscious processes in metacognition, (c) methodological issues in metacognition research, (d) individual differences in metacognition, and (e) metacognition and self-regulation. The need for theoretical integration is pointed out and the prospects for research that can encompass metacognitive phenomena and methodologies, which were not, or little, studied in the past, are envisaged.

Children’s Metacognition and Theory of Mind: Bridging the Gap

Children’s metacognitive and theory of mind development have been the subjects of intensive research during the last two decades. These two strands of research have proceeded independently, in spite of their shared interest in children’s growing awareness of their own and others’ mental processes. The aim of the present chapter is to review some recent initiatives to establish connections between these two research fields. The chapter is organized into three sections. The first section introduces the metacognition and theory of mind constructs and provides a brief overview of evidence regarding the age that these two abilities begin to develop. The second discusses reasons for the separation between the metacognition and theory of mind research fields. The third section outlines two theoretical models which attempt to integrate theory of mind within a larger metacognition framework and discusses some recent studies that aimed to explore developmental relationships between: (a) children’s theory of mind and metamemory abilities, and (b) children’s theory of mind and metacognitive language.

Children's Developing Ability to Depict Emotions in Their Drawings

55 children aged 5 to 9 years were asked to draw pictures depicting happiness, sadness, anger, surprise, and fear as well as pictures that did not express any emotion. These pictures were then scored by nonexpert adults for their overall emotional expressiveness, that is, how well they depicted the intended emotion. The results showed that drawings were generally regarded by adults as emotionally expressive. Happiness was the emotion most easily recognized in childrens drawings, closely followed by sadness. The results also showed a linear increase in ratings of emotional expressiveness with age.

Associations Between Emotional Intelligence, Socio-Emotional Adjustment, and Academic Achievement in Childhood The Influence of Age

This study examined the relationship between trait emotional intelligence (EI) with children’s socio-emotional adjustment at school and academic achievement. Children aged 8 to 10 (n = 106) and 11 to 13 years (n = 99) completed the youth version of the Emotional Quotient Inventory (EQ-i: YV). Their socio-emotional adjustment was measured with scales from the Teacher’s Report Form assessing socio-emotional problems and adaptive functioning at school. Trait EI was positively correlated with aspects of children’s adaptive functioning and academic achievement only in the 11- to 13-year-old but not in the 8- to 10-year-old group. Our results illustrate the importance of taking age into consideration when assessing the relationship between trait EI with socio-emotional adjustment at school and academic achievement. The consequences and limitations of these findings are discussed.

emotion in children's art do young children understand the emotions expressed in other children's drawings?

This study examined developmental changes in childrens ability to understand the emotions expressed in other childrens drawings. Eighty participants, at each of four age groups — three, four, five and six years — were presented with a series of child drawings, each expressing a different emotion (happiness, sadness, anger or fear). All drawings had been previously rated by adult judges on an emotion-intensity scale as being good exemplars of the emotions examined. Next, participants were shown pictures of child artists each expressing one of the designated emotions on her/his face and were instructed to identify the artist who created each drawing. The results showed that: (i) by age three, children demonstrated an understanding of the emotions expressed in drawings; (ii) happiness, sadness and fear were the emotions most easily recognized by participants. Overall, these results provide support for the assertion that the ability to understand the emotional meaning of drawings is present from the preschool years.

Representations of loneliness in children’s drawings

This article reports the results of a study which aimed to examine the development of children’s ability to depict loneliness in their drawings. Seventy-eight children and 20 adults took part in the study. Participants were first asked a series of questions assessing their conceptions of loneliness, and were then invited to draw a picture that conveys loneliness. The resulting drawings were coded and scored for the presence of the two dimensions of loneliness: cognitive and emotional. First, the authors examined the use by participants of graphic indicators denoting deficiencies in one’s social relations resulting to loneliness (cognitive dimension); second, they assessed the expressive strategies participants employed to convey the negative affect that typically accompanies loneliness in their drawings (emotional dimension). Finally, the authors tested the relationship between children’s definitions of loneliness with their drawings of the construct. The results show a clear developmental progression in children’s pictorial representations of loneliness. Whereas the majority of young children represented loneliness as the absence of a social network, older children used graphic indicators to convey both the absence of a social network and the sadness that accompanies loneliness. In contrast to children, adults consistently included symbolic or metaphoric graphic indicators in their drawings to convey the negative affect accompanying the experience of loneliness.

The Differential Effects of Written and Spoken Presentation for the Modification of Interpretation and Judgmental Bias in Children

Background: Interpretation training programs, in which individuals are trained to interpret ambiguous scenarios in either a negative or benign way, have proven effective in altering anxiety-related cognitive biases in both children and adults. Aims: The current study investigated whether the effects of the interpretation training procedure in children are differentiated according to the mode of presentation of the training. Method: Ninety-four primary school children (aged 10–12 years) scoring above the mean on a social anxiety scale were randomly allocated to four groups, in which they were trained using written or spoken presentation of training materials in either the negative or benign direction. Results: For the negative training, children who heard the training material spoken aloud (spoken presentation) made more negative interpretations of ambiguous social events, compared to children who read the training material (written presentation). However, for the benign training, there was less clear evidence for a differentiation of the effects between the two modes of presentation, although children in the spoken presentation group performed better in a stressful task and showed a trend to rate their mood as more positive after the task than children in the written presentation group. Conclusions: These results not only forward our understanding of the mechanism of the genesis of cognitive bias in children, but also highlight the need for further investigation of how to optimize the effectiveness of interpretation training in children.

Individual Differences in Children's Understanding of Guilt: Links with Theory of Mind

ABSTRACT The author examined the relation between individual differences in childrens understanding of guilt and theory of mind (ToM) ability. Two hundred and eighteen 8- to 10-year-old children were asked to define what guilt is and report a personal experience in which they felt this emotion. ToM was assessed with the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test (Childrens version; Baron-Cohen et al., 2001) and with the Strange Stories test (Happè, 1994). There were marked differences in childrens understanding of guilt even after controlling for age. Moreover, high levels of understanding of guilt were associated with high levels of performance on both ToM tests. The theoretical and practical implications of these results are discussed.

Mind What Teachers Say: Kindergarten Teachers’ Use of Mental State Language During Picture Story Narration

The study focuses on the mental state language kindergarten teachers use when narrating picture stories. The aims were to examine (a) individual differences in the frequency with which kindergarten teachers use mental state terms, (b) the types of mental state terms (e.g., emotion, desire, belief terms) teachers use most frequently, and (c) the effect that the content of the story to be narrated has on teachers’ use of mental state language. A total of 38 kindergarten teachers took part in the study. Participants were asked to narrate a familiar picture story and six short illustrated stories that fell into one of two categories: behavioral or mentalistic. Behavioral stories emphasized the story characters’ actions, whereas mentalistic stories emphasized the story characters’ mental states. Research Findings: The results showed a significant variation in kindergarten teachers’ use of mental state terms. Moreover, teachers used significantly more cognitive state terms than terms expressing other mental states (e.g., emotions and desires). The content of the picture story (behavioral, mentalistic) was not found to have an effect on teachers’ use of mental state language. Practice or Policy: Implications of these findings for educators are discussed.

Understanding internal and external shame in childhood: the role of theory of mind

ABSTRACT Shame can be either internal or external. The former type of shame is associated with what one thinks and feels about one’s self, the latter is linked with what one believes that others think about the self. This study aimed to (a) compare children’s ability to understand these two types of shame and (b) test the hypothesis that only external shame attribution is linked to children’s ability to understand second-order beliefs. Four- to 6-year-old children (N = 93) were presented with a task assessing their ability to attribute internal and external shame to story protagonists. Children were also tested on a battery of first-order and second-order theory of mind tasks. The results provide evidence for a parallel age-related increase in children’s understanding of the two types of shame. In line with our hypothesis, only external, but not internal, shame attribution was associated with children’s ability to understand others’ second-order beliefs.