DEVELOPMENT OF CHILDREN'S TELEOLOGICAL VIEW OF ARTIFACTS

这个项目关注儿童的目的论倾向的发展，将物体视为“为功能而设计的”。“对于成年人来说，目的论假设为解释和推断人工制品（如椅子）和生物结构（如眼睛）提供了关键基础（Dennett，1987）。 然而，先前的研究表明，与成年人相比，幼儿也会模仿非生物的自然物体，如岩石，作为设计的目的。 目前的建议的主要目标是了解为什么儿童过度属性的功能，以非生物的自然种类，通过研究3至6岁的发展进程的概念之间的关系的设计，功能和身份的文物。 关注人工制品来探讨这个问题有几个原因。 首先，对于成年人来说，人工制品提供了为某种功能而存在的对象的最清晰的实例，因为它们的出现完全是由设计者的意图来解释的，即它们实现了某种目标。 第二，关于儿童为什么要用目的论的术语来解释岩石等实体的性质，有一个假设是，在没有其他解释的情况下，他们把它们当作有意设计的准人工制品（Kelemen，1998;还有Piaget，1929）。 拟议的研究旨在复制，扩展和澄清先前的工作，儿童和成人的目的论思想使用各种实验方法和扩大的年龄范围。 一组研究使用行为主动的方法来检查儿童是否认为他们自己的意图是固定他们刚刚设计的人工制品的功能和身份。 第二组研究操纵信息的起源和目前使用的一个新的人工制品，以研究其对儿童的判断对象的身份和功能的影响。 最后一组研究探讨了幼儿容易出现经典心理现象“功能性固定”的程度。“使用这些方法来了解儿童对人工制品的目的论信念的状况，将为儿童关于人工和自然世界的直觉和科学理论的形成和发展提供必要的洞察力。

This project concerns the development of children's teleological tendency to view objects as "designed for a function." For adults, teleological assumptions provide a critical basis for explanation and inference about artifacts, such as chairs, and biological structures, such as eyes, (Dennett, 1987). Previous studies suggest however, that, in contrast to adults, young children also construe non-living natural objects, such as rocks, as designed for a purpose. The major goal of the current proposal is to understand why children over-attribute function to non-biological natural kinds by studying developmental progressions in 3- to 6-year-olds conception of the relationship between the design, function and identity of artifacts. There are several reasons for focusing on artifacts to explore this question. First, for adults, artifacts provide the clearest instance of objects that exist for a function because their occurrence is entirely explained by a designer's intention that they fulfill some goal. Second, one hypothesis as to why children explain the properties of entities such a rocks in teleological terms is that in the absence of alternative accounts, they treat them as intentionally-designed quasi- artifacts (Kelemen, 1998; also Piaget, 1929). The proposed studies aim to replicate, extend, and clarify prior work on children's and adult's teleological thought using a variety of experimental methods and an expanded age range. One set of studies uses behaviorally-active methods to examine whether children view their own intentions as fixing the function and identity of an artifact that they have just designed. A second set of studies manipulates information about the origin and current use of a novel artifact in order to study its influence on children's judgments of the object's identity and function. A final set of studies explores the degree to which young children fall prone to the classic psychological phenomenon of "functional fixedness." Using these methods to understand the status of children's teleological beliefs about artifacts will provide needed insight into the formation and development of children's intuitive and scientific theories about both the artificial and natural world.