New research has begun to explain why young children often take in 'information that won’t help them' complete a task, hinting at why they're so curious as their brains develop.
Whether you need to keep kids entertained on a long car journey, or you're just after some peace and quite in the mornings as you drink your coffee, sharing mind-blowing facts with your kids is a great way to engage their brains and, hopefully, get them thinking rather than babbling away.
They might want the answers to fun questions like 'why do birds sing in the morning?' or be desperate to know 'why pirates wear an eye patch.' Whatever it is, information is something kids are often obsessed about, always asking why, why, why.
And now, new research is starting to tell us why.
In a new study, conducted by Ohio State University, researchers set out to explain why children often gather more information than they need to complete a task, exploring new ways to solve it even when they know the best solution and have done in many times before.
“Children can’t seem to stop themselves from gathering more information than they need to complete a task, even when they know exactly what they need,” Vladimir Sloutsky, co-author of the study and professor of psychology at The Ohio State University said.
Sloutsky and the other researchers originally thought this might be because children’s brains aren't mature enough to understand the task or pay proper attention, or because they are easily distracted and lack the control to focus.
But, to their surprise, the researchers found that the most likely explanation for this 'over-exploring' is that working memory is not fully developed in children. Therefore, while adults can easily remember the best way to complete a task, children are forced to question their often correct memories and re-explore tasks they've done before.
Simply, children don’t hold information they need to complete a task in their memory for very long, the study suggests.
Speaking about one of the tasks children were asked to complete in the study, where they were asked to identify an animal by uncovering parts of a hidden picture of them, Sloutsky explained that even though it became obvious after a few tries that the tail was the easiest and quickest part to uncover in order to identify the animal, the kids 'just kept uncovering more body parts before they made their choice.'
“The children learned that one body part will tell them what the creature is, but they may be concerned that they don’t remember correctly. Their working memory is still under development,” Sloutsky said.
“They want to resolve this uncertainty by continuing to sample, by looking at other body parts to see if they line up with what they think.”
The children in the study were aged between four and six, with more research set to uncover exactly when children’s working memory improves and gives them the confidence to 'act more like adults do' when it comes to completing tasks.
To keep your little one's mind active, we've compiled 35 riddles for kids, explained why we say 'white rabbits' on the first of every month, and explained what HARIBO actually stands for - and it'll blow your mind well as your kids'!
