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Social learning from media: The need for a culturally diachronic developmental psychology

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posted on 2024-08-23, 11:52 authored by M Nielsen, Tze Kiet FongTze Kiet Fong, A Whiten
Since the proliferation of television sets into households began over half a century ago there has been widespread interest in the impact that viewing has on young children's development. Such interest has grown with the increasing availability of smart phones and tablets. In this review we examine the literature documenting human social learning and how this learning is impacted when the instructing agent appears on a screen instead of face-to-face. We then explore the shifting nature of screen-based media, with a focus on the increasingly socio-normative manner information is portrayed. We discuss how the changing nature of screen technology might be altering how children interpret what they see, and raise the possibility that this may render prevailing evidence as historical documentation, rather than setting out established developmental milestones that transcend the period in which they were documented. We contend that recognizing the significance of historically changing contexts in developmental psychology is timely when the COVID-19 climate is pushing data collection on-line for many labs, often using tasks that were developed primarily for face-to-face contexts.

History

Preferred citation

Nielsen, M., Fong, F. T. K. & Whiten, A. (2021). Social learning from media: The need for a culturally diachronic developmental psychology. Advances in Child Development and Behavior (61, pp. 317-334). Elsevier. https://doi.org/10.1016/bs.acdb.2021.04.001

Book title

Advances in Child Development and Behavior

Publisher

Elsevier

Pagination

317-334

Series

Advances in Child Development and Behavior

Volume

61

ISBN

9780128245774

ISSN

0065-2407