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      Using Storybooks to Teach Children About Illness Transmission and Promote Adaptive Health Behavior – A Pilot Study

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          Abstract

          Although there is a large and growing literature on children’s developing concepts of illness transmission, little is known about how children develop contagion knowledge before formal schooling begins and how these informal learning experiences can impact children’s health behaviors. Here, we asked two important questions: first, do children’s informal learning experiences, such as their experiences reading storybooks, regularly contain causal information about illness transmission; and second, what is the impact of this type of experience on children’s developing knowledge and behavior? In Study 1, we examined whether children’s commercial books about illness regularly contain contagion-relevant causal information. In Study 2, we ran a pilot study examining whether providing children with causal information about illness transmission in a storybook can influence their knowledge and subsequent behavior when presented with a contaminated object. The results from Study 1 suggest that very few (15%) children’s books about illness feature biological causal mechanisms for illness transmission. However, results from Study 2 suggest that storybooks containing contagion-relevant explanations about illness transmission may encourage learning and avoidance of contaminated objects. Altogether, these results provide preliminary data suggesting that future research should focus on engaging children in learning about contagion and encouraging adaptive health behaviors.

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          Young children can be taught basic natural selection using a picture-storybook intervention.

          Adaptation by natural selection is a core mechanism of evolution. It is also one of the most widely misunderstood scientific processes. Misconceptions are rooted in cognitive biases found in preschoolers, yet concerns about complexity mean that adaptation by natural selection is generally not comprehensively taught until adolescence. This is long after untutored theoretical misunderstandings are likely to have become entrenched. In a novel approach, we explored 5- to 8-year-olds' capacities to learn a basic but theoretically coherent mechanistic explanation of adaptation through a custom storybook intervention. Experiment 1 showed that children understood the population-based logic of natural selection and also generalized it. Furthermore, learning endured 3 months later. Experiment 2 replicated these results and showed that children understood and applied an even more nuanced mechanistic causal explanation. The findings demonstrate that, contrary to conventional educational wisdom, basic natural selection is teachable in early childhood. Theory-driven interventions using picture storybooks with rich explanatory structure are beneficial.
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            Cultural and experiential differences in the development of folkbiological induction

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              Folkbiological reasoning from a cross-cultural developmental perspective: early essentialist notions are shaped by cultural beliefs.

              In 2 experiments, the authors examined the evolution of folkbiological reasoning in children (4 to 10 years of age) and adults from 4 distinct communities (rural Native American, rural majority culture, and suburban and urban North American communities). Using an adoption paradigm, they examined participants' intuitions regarding the inheritance of properties and the mechanisms underlying the transmission of kindhood. Across all communities and ages, there was a strong biological component underlying reasoning about the inheritance of properties. There were also differences in children's intuitions about the mechanisms underlying kindhood: Native American children were more likely than their counterparts to consider blood as a candidate biological essence. This suggests that as children search to discover the underlying essence of a biological kind, they are guided by broad essentialist notions that are shaped by discourse within their community.
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                Author and article information

                Contributors
                Journal
                Front Psychol
                Front Psychol
                Front. Psychol.
                Frontiers in Psychology
                Frontiers Media S.A.
                1664-1078
                05 June 2020
                2020
                : 11
                : 942
                Affiliations
                [1] 1Center for Developmental Science, Department of Psychology, William Paterson University , Wayne, NJ, United States
                [2] 2Child Study Center, Department of Psychology, Rutgers University , Newark, NJ, United States
                Author notes

                Edited by: Yvette Renee Harris, Miami University, United States

                Reviewed by: Tanya Kaefer, Lakehead University, Canada; Laura Guidotti, University of Parma, Italy

                *Correspondence: Megan Conrad, geerdtsm@ 123456wpunj.edu

                This article was submitted to Developmental Psychology, a section of the journal Frontiers in Psychology

                Article
                10.3389/fpsyg.2020.00942
                7289927
                32581904
                175998d2-30c7-4b45-8dd9-50ee634792ff
                Copyright © 2020 Conrad, Kim, Blacker, Walden and LoBue.

                This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

                History
                : 27 January 2020
                : 16 April 2020
                Page count
                Figures: 3, Tables: 3, Equations: 0, References: 39, Pages: 12, Words: 0
                Funding
                Funded by: James S. McDonnell Foundation 10.13039/100000913
                Categories
                Psychology
                Original Research

                Clinical Psychology & Psychiatry
                contagion,germs,storybook,intervention,behavioral avoidance
                Clinical Psychology & Psychiatry
                contagion, germs, storybook, intervention, behavioral avoidance

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