Don’t Try This at Home: Toddlers’ Imitation of New Skills from People on Video

摘要

Imitation of people on educational television is a potential way for very young children to learn new skills. Although toddlers in previous studies exhibited a “video deficit” in learning, 24-month-olds in Study 1 successfully reproduced behaviors modeled by a person who was on video as well as they did those modeled by a person who was present in the room (even after a 24-hour delay). Neither displaced filming context nor cuts between actions affected toddler’s imitation from video. Shortening the demonstration in Study 2 affected imitation in the video condition but not in the live condition. In Study 3, 24-month-olds who viewed the original, longer videos on their family TV (with which they had a viewing history) imitated significantly less than those who viewed the videos on the lab monitor. Imitation of a live modeler was the same across settings (home or lab). Implications for toddlers’ judgments of reliable information sources and for the design of educational television programs are discussed.