School of Applied Psychology and Applied Cognitive Neuroscience Research Unit, Behavioural Basis of Health Program, Griffith Health Institute, Griffith University, Gold Coast, QLD 4222, Australia.
J Exp Child Psychol. 2012 May;112(1):84-101. doi: 10.1016/j.jecp.2011.12.004. Epub 2012 Jan 20.
Two experiments examined conditional discrimination in 4- to 6-year-olds. Children learned to choose one of two objects (e.g., circle) when the background was, say, red and to choose the other object (e.g., triangle) when the background was, say, blue. Awareness was assessed and interpreted as a marker of relational processing. In Experiment 1, most 4- and 5-year-olds did not reach the learning criterion. Children in Experiment 2 solved simpler reversal learning problems before the conditional discrimination problems. Most 4- to 6-year-olds reached criterion, but they did not necessarily demonstrate awareness, suggesting that reversal learning and conditional discrimination can be acquired through associative or relational processing. Relational processing increased with age and was used more on simpler problems. Fluid intelligence predicted Problem 2 performance in children who used relational (not associative) processing on Problem 1. Prior experience with simpler problems and awareness of relational structure are influential in children's conditional discrimination.
两项实验检验了 4 至 6 岁儿童的条件辨别能力。儿童需要学会在背景为红色时选择一个物体（例如圆形），而在背景为蓝色时选择另一个物体（例如三角形）。意识被评估并被解释为关系处理的标志。在实验 1 中，大多数 4 岁和 5 岁的儿童未达到学习标准。实验 2 中的儿童在解决条件辨别问题之前先解决了更简单的反转学习问题。大多数 4 至 6 岁的儿童达到了标准，但他们不一定表现出意识，这表明反转学习和条件辨别可以通过联想或关系处理来获得。关系处理随着年龄的增长而增加，并且在更简单的问题上使用得更多。流体智力预测了在问题 1 中使用关系（而不是联想）处理的儿童在问题 2 中的表现。在儿童的条件辨别中，更简单问题的先前经验和对关系结构的意识是有影响的。
