幼兒對於心智理解作業的理解情形及運用故事活動介入的效果研究

Young Children’s Comprehension of Related Theory of Mind Tasks and the Intervention Effect of Story Reading with Extensive Activities

保心怡

指導教授 ： 簡淑真

國立臺灣師範大學/教育學院/人類發展與家庭學系在職進修碩士班/博士(2002年)

摘要

「幼兒對於心智理解相關作業的理解情形及運用故事活動介入的效果研究」
摘 要
本研究的目的是試圖探討及台灣幼兒在心智理解發展上的共通性及差異性，並初步嘗試將教學實務與幼兒的心智理解發展加以連結。本研究第一部分研究對象是來自在臺灣城鄉、家庭背景不同的幼兒園中四∼六歲幼兒，研究者試圖運用數項心智理解相關作業（錯誤相信作業、意向作業及外表�真實作業）來初步探索了家庭背景、性別及語言能力因素和幼兒心智理解發展的關係。本研究第二部份則試圖檢視故事活動的介入對於「關鍵的三、四歲」幼兒心智理解的效果，研究中針對四歲幼兒組進行一系列蘊含了心智相關元素的故事教學活動，並檢驗介入對於增進幼兒理解相關心智理解作業（錯誤相信作業、意向作業及外表�真實作業）的效果。
研究結果發現，四至六歲幼兒對於錯誤相信作業的理解具有隨年齡而進展的趨勢，兩園四歲組幼兒通過率皆在機會水準之下，而分別在四歲、五歲之間存在躍昇的現象。而兩個幼兒園幼兒的心智理解發展上具有明顯的差異，意謂不容忽視家庭背景對於幼兒心智理解發展的影響。
在幼兒對於意向作業的理解方面，在知道－意向測試中，四歲至五歲之間似乎是一轉變的階段，即幼兒能較清楚地理解具有訊息（知道）者的行動是「故意」的。在相似行為－意向作業中，幼兒需要去指認出一些目標導向的行動〈如：手�身體動作〉或是反映在語言中的訊息（如：「丟」相對於「掉」），研究顯示五歲可能為一轉變階段，但距離成熟的理解尚有一段距離，六歲組幼兒能同時正確回答閉鎖及開放（適切判斷）問題者尚未達機會水準。整體而言，幼兒在六歲之前對意向的理解仍隨年齡增長而增進，幼兒漸能依行動者的心智狀態來做判斷，而非僅憑外在的行為線索來理解意向，而家庭背景變項仍是一造成幼兒理解表現差異的因素。
幼兒在外表�真實的作業的表現上，家庭背景及年齡層造成的差異則皆未達顯著，而四歲組幼兒的表現已接近機會水準，在本研究中再度證實了外表�真實作業本質上和通過錯誤相信作業的能力有關（皆是在了解幼兒能否運用一種以上的方式來表徵一物體）。
研究中並印證了勝任錯誤相信作業所需的能力和勝任知識－意向測試所需的能力密切相關，而且前者對於後者有相當的預測力。
本研究的第二部份針對四歲幼兒組故事活動介入的重點包括：在每個具錯誤相信、欺騙或外表/真實的故事片段中討論及強調故事主角的知覺、知道狀態及與行動的關係；使用思考泡泡的型態來標示故事中主角的思考狀態；重述故事以加強故事脈絡之事件記憶；以幼兒本身為故事主角練習類推故事情節及讓幼兒經歷錯誤相信、欺騙及外表/真實等。結果顯示，實驗組幼兒在錯誤相信作業理解及相似行為－意向理解作業上的增進達到顯著，意謂在教學活動的介入可能有助於幼兒意識到事件主角的知覺、相信等心智狀態或因熟悉情境脈絡而助於突破某些心智作業理解上的瓶頸，但實驗組幼兒仍未達第一部份所呈現五歲組幼兒之理解水準，四歲組幼兒要達到穩定而成熟的概念上的轉變和理解，仍有其限制。

關鍵字

心智理論 ； 社會認知 ； 幼兒

並列摘要

An Abstract of
Young Children’s Comprehension of Related Theory of Mind Tasks and the
Intervention Effect of Story Reading with Extensive Activities
The purpose of this study was to explore preschoolers’ understanding of mind, especially focus on commonality and difference of development. Researcher also tries to make connection between teaching practice and children’s development. Subjects of the first part of this research was four to six years old and came from two kindergartens located in city and urban separately. Researcher describes and analyzes variables as family background, gender and language ability related to children’s responses to some standardized situation（including measures of false belief , intention and the appearance-reality distinction）. The second part of this research was to experimentally manipulate four- years old children’s exposure to story telling activities to determine whether training would have an impact on children’s performance on measures of measures of false belief, intention and the appearance-reality distinction.
The results shows that during the preschool years, striking changes take place in children’s performance on related theory-of-mind tasks. In contrast to their 4-year-old counterparts, 4-year-olds typically perform very poorly except in measure of appearance-reality distinction. The modal interpretation of these findings is that young preschoolers suffer from a conceptual deficit of one kind or another: They are said to lack a concept of belief, or a concept of mental representation. Since a powerful influence on children’s growing understanding of others’ minds is most likely culture, the results show that the performance of children from different background is significantly different.
In addition, the results show that young children’s comprehension in different kind of tasks is related. The performance of measures of false belief and knowledge –intention was highly related.
As to the second part of the research, the present data only minimally support the hypothesis. The mean scores of false belief and similar-behavioral intention measures did differ after intervention. It implies that intervention may enhance children’s awareness of protagonist’s operation of mind such as perception and belief. However, the improvement still limited. The results provide a basis for evaluating the limitation and the advantage of using multiple teaching materials and methods.

並列關鍵字

theory of mind ； social congnition ； young children

參考文獻

張正芬、鍾玉梅 (民75) 學前兒童語言發展量表之修訂及其相關研究。特殊教育研究學刊，2,37-52。

Appleton, M., & Reddy, V. (1996). Teaching three year-olds to pass false belief tests: A conversational approach, Social Development, 5, 275-291.

Astington, J. W. (2001). The paradox of intention: Assessing children’s metarepresentational understanding. The MIT Press.

Astington, J. W., & Jenkins, J. M. (1999). A longitudinal study of the relation between language and theory of mind development. Developmental Psychology, 35(5), 1311-1320.

Astington, J. W., & Olson, D. R. (1995). The cognitive revolution in children’s under- standing of mind. Human Development, 38, 179-189.