Imitation in Young Children

Nielsen, M. & Blank, C. (2011). Imitation in young children: When who gets copied is more important than what gets copied. Developmental Psychology 47(4), 1050-1053.

In this brief report Nielsen and Blank (2011) observed how 36 children (19 boys and 17 girls) aged 4-5 years old imitated a task when independently performed by two adults, one who completed the task with “efficiency” and the other with extra “irrelevant” actions. The task was to open a small box, that had a metal latch, and take a toy out of it. In the trials the adults demonstrated the task each three times, in three different ways, two ways involved some irrelevant actions, and one way simply moved the metal latch and opened the box to reveal the toy. Prior to opening the box the adult demonstrator began with the directive “watch me”. The child sat in front of the demonstrator with their parent by their side. After the first demonstrator performed the task they left the room, and the second demonstrator stayed to perform their form of the task. At the end of the demonstration the adult announced “now it is your turn” (p. 1051) and handed the box to the child. Only one demonstrator was in the room to watch the child open the box and take out the toy.

In result the child imitated the actions that were modeled by the demonstrator that stayed in the room, even if the demonstrator was the one that performed the “irrelevant” acts to open the box. Some of the irrelevant acts included rotating the box, or tapping the box with an object. The authors use the term overimitation in relationship to the imitation of acts with no purposeful or function, modeled after an adults actions. They point out how children learn through imitation, and that young children or novices may learn behaviors that may not be relevant to completing a task.

While the stimuli in this research study was “a box” that could have been opened by swinging a small latch and lifting up the top, the children continued to complete a series of irrelevant acts when in the presence of the adult who performed these same acts. This may speak to the human desire for social approval and human connection. The authors note that imitation or copying is “likely to prove a hallmark of what it means to be human” (p. 1052).

The role of imitation seems to play a clear role in the development of human interactions, learning of language, and the passing along of traditions. This leads me to support the investigation of the neural mechanisms involved in imitation and the role that this may play among the social and communicative development of children with autism.