Online level-2 perspective taking for newly learnt symbols.

Humans demonstrate spontaneous sensitivity to other people's perspectives on object identities in online tasks. Evidence shows that this not only involves representing the mere discrepancy between perspectives, but the content of such perspectives as well (level-2 perspective taking/L2PT). However, this evidence comes from studies using culturally grounded symbols which leaves open the possibility that having extensive, easily accessible background knowledge about an object is necessary for the L2PT effect.

[Small steps toward an empathic multicultural world through a new perspective of social categorization as a tool in adaptive learning].

The investigation of the role and the mechanisms of social categorization has been in the focus of psychological research for quite a long time. However, the developmental approach to categorization and the arrangement of empirical findings within this field into a unified framework have received little attention so far. Based on the currently available evidence the paper proposes a new theory of 'culturally shared knowledge'.

Learning how to use a tool: Mutually exclusive tool-function mappings are selectively acquired from linguistic in-group models.

The current study investigated whether 4-year-olds used language as a cue to social group membership to infer whether the tool-use behavior of a model needed to be encoded as indicative of the tool's function. We built on children's tendency to treat functions as mutually exclusive, that is, their propensity to refrain from using the same tool for more than one function. We hypothesized that children would form mutually exclusive tool-function mappings only if the source of the function information was a linguistic in-group person (native) as opposed to an out-group (foreign) person.

3-Year-Old Children Selectively Generalize Object Functions Following a Demonstration from a Linguistic In-group Member: Evidence from the Phenomenon of Scale Error.

The present study investigated 3-year-old children's learning processes about object functions. We built on children's tendency to commit scale errors with tools to explore whether they would selectively endorse object functions from a linguistic in-group over an out-group model. Participants (n = 37) were presented with different object sets, and a model speaking either in their native or a foreign language demonstrated how to use the presented tools.