Another One for Science

Two weeks ago I took Oliver over to the University of Minnesota on a Saturday afternoon to play "games."  At least that's how I explained the purpose of our excursion.  Really, I'd volunteered him for another child development study, so he was going to be hanging out with a child psychology PhD student named Emily. Both he and Soren are in a database of volunteers U researchers can call upon.  The last time he was "called up" was when he was four months old.   

This study was conducted by the Carlson Child Development Lab and sought to study preschool children’s self-control and number skills.  The e-mail I received ahead of time explained that the "purpose of this study is to examine how children’s understanding of various number concepts in combination with their ability to control impulses can improve their performance on a choice task. Specifically, we are studying whether changing the amount and size of rewards can improve children’s performance on a task where they are required to pick a smaller amount in order to receive a larger amount."

When I finished reading the purpose out loud to Chris, I looked up at him and we both laughed.  They were going to see if Oliver could control his impulses!  That's not exactly the strength of a three-year-old. 

Chris and I had pumped Oliver up over the idea of playing games and he was really excited when we first arrived.  Emily met us in front of the building and was warm and bubbly and clearly had a lot of experience with young children.  (In fact, Oliver was participant 86 out of 100 for this study alone.  At an hour long each, that's a lot of hours invested!) However, Oliver burst into tears when we arrived at the room where the study was conducted.  He clearly knew something big was happening and he freaked out.  Emily was a pro at distraction and while she assured him mom would be staying the whole time in the room with him, she engaged him in making "cupcakes" with playdough and from that point on, I don't know if he even looked back at me until the hour was up.    Emily ran him through a series of "games" and it was impressive how smoothly she juggled asking Oliver questions, sorting cards and other props needed, recording answers, encouraging him and gently redirecting him if he showed the slightest sign of disinterest and remaining upbeat question after question, experiment after experiment, given this was the 86th time through her spiel.  But the most impressive of all was that Oliver sat in his chair the entire time and was completely engaged.  How did I not think to ask if Emily babysits? 

In one experiment, Oliver was presented with two bins with balls in each one.  He was instructed to pick a bin and the contents of that bin would go in the basket for the stuffed monkey.  The contents of the bin he didn't pick would go into his basket.  The goal was to end up with more balls in your basket than the monkey's basket.  As you can imagine, Oliver started by picking the bin with the most balls and they would then go to the monkey.  I was amazed that he figured out that he actually had to pick the bin with the smaller "prize' to get a bigger "prize" later, and impressed that it only took him two or three rounds to catch on.   Some of the experiments were really difficult for a three-year-old. In one, he was given a piece of paper with a line and a 0 on the left end of the line and a 10 on the other end.  He was shown a card with a number on it and instructed to mark with his crayon where he thought that number should be on the line.  He did okay with the 0-10 paper, again, surprised that he even had any idea how numbers related to each other in this way, but with the 0-20 paper, he marked around where the 2 should be for the next six cards.   Emily explained afterward that they start the kids out with the easiest questions and then progressively get harder.  The child has to get six answers wrong in a row before Emily can stop and move on to a different experiment.  If the child answers a question correctly, even if it's clear he had no clue and was only guessing, she continues with a harder question.  That would explain why in one experiment, Oliver was being asked math questions I was having trouble with.  He'd gone a couple of rounds of getting five questions wrong and then the sixth question right, so he was eventually on fifth-grade-level questions. 

Just when I thought Emily's luck in keeping Oliver so engaged had to run out, she wrapped up the last experiment and cheerfully thanked Oliver for coming to play with her.  He beamed.  She let him pick out a t-shirt for his participation.  His said University of Minnesota "Junior Scientist" on it. 

I've been asked what motivates me to take a chunk of my time from a weekend afternoon to participate in something like this.  For one, any reason to get Oliver out of the house during Soren's afternoon nap means that Soren will actually get to sleep.  But also, I do a lot of reading on the topics of child development and early childhood education and the authors reference studies conducted at universities all over the world.  Behind each of those studies are hundreds or even thousands of participants like Oliver and Soren.  I had my theory about whether a three-year-old could delay gratification, but until you pair 100 of them up with a stuffed monkey, you don't actually know the answer is.