Turns Out Books with Realistic Characters Lead to Better Learning
University of Toronto
August 18, 2017
If you want to help
develop social skills like sharing in your nieces and nephews, a new
study finds that reading books that feature humans, not animals, are a
better choice.
Children's picture books featuring human
characters – not cute animals – are best suited to teaching lessons like
telling the truth and sharing, says a study from U of T's Ontario
Institute for Studies in Education (OISE).
The study shows 4 to
6-year-olds learn moral lessons most effectively with human characters,
not human-like animals, or anthropomorphic characters. So, stories about
a conniving fox, a puppet who lies and gets in all kinds of trouble, or
a turtle who perseveres, can often miss the mark, the study finds.
“Many
people believe children find stories with human-like animals
captivating and relatable, but what we’re finding is that this is not
the case,” says Patricia Ganea, associate professor of early cognitive
development at OISE who was a lead researcher on the study. “Overall,
children were more likely to act on the moral of the story when it
featured a human character.
Human versus human-like animal characters
“That’s because many kids don’t see
these characters as similar to themselves. They’re less likely to
translate social lessons from these stories into their everyday lives,”
It’s
important, she says, since so much of children’s media – books, movies,
video games, etc. – use human-like animal characters.
Ganea says the results highlight that picture books can have an immediate impact on children’s social behavior.
“Books
that children can easily relate to increase their ability to apply the
story’s lesson to their daily lives,” she says. “It is important for
educators and parents to choose carefully when the goal is to teach
real-world knowledge and social behaviours through storybooks.”
In
the study, children listened to a story with either human or human-like
animal characters who spoke and wore clothes. Each book taught children
about sharing with others. Children’s altruistic giving was assessed
before and after the reading.
Overall, preschoolers shared more
after listening to the book with human characters. Children who were
read the book with animal characters shared less after the reading.
Researchers
assessed whether children viewed anthropmorphic animal characters as
human or not. Most children said these animals lacked human
characteristics. Of the children who read the animal book, those who
attributed human characteristics to anthropomorphic animals shared more
after reading. Researchers say one of the reasons some children did not
act generously may have been because they did not interpret the
anthropomorphic animals as similar to themselves.
Books with realistic characters lead to better learning
Graduate
student Nicole Larsen, who worked with Ganea on the study as part of her
master’s degree, adds, “Parents can play an important role in
children’s learning by asking them to explain parts of the story and
helping them see the similarity between the story and their own lives.”
In
the study, children first had a chance to share some of their 10
stickers with another child. They were then read one of three books: a
book about sharing with human characters, the same book with
anthropomorphic animal characters or a book about seeds. This book was
used to check how sharing changed when the story did not involve
sharing. After the reading, children had another chance to give away new
stickers. The number of stickers shared provided a measure of
children’s altruistic giving.
Children's sharing tested
Children were also asked to
categorize different pictures of human, anthropomorphic and realistic
animals with either human traits or animal traits.
To see if a
story with animal characters is more appealing to young children, the
researchers asked the children who read the seeds book to choose between
the human and animal books.
Overall, the researchers found:
- Children shared more after reading the human book and less after reading the animal book or the unrelated book about seeds.
-
The more a child attributed human characteristics to the
anthropomorphic animals, the more they shared after reading the animal
book.
- Children did not prefer one type of book over the other.
The study appeared online in the August issue of Developmental Science.
Photo: oksun70
Citation:
University of Toronto. (2017, August 17). Kids learn moral lessons more
effectively from stories with humans than human-like animals. ScienceDaily. Retrieved August 18, 2017