Perspective Taking
Perspective taking goes far beyond empathy; it involves figuring out what others think and feel, and forms the basis for children’s understanding of their parents’, teachers’, and friends’ intentions. Children who can take others’ perspectives are also much less likely to get involved in conflicts.
Think about the conflicts you have experienced recently -- whether it is with your child or someone else in your family, or with someone in a store or at work. And think about the hostilities in the world. Chances are that the inability to see things as others see them is at the heart of these problems.
Perspective taking calls on many of the executive functions of the brain. It requires inhibitory control, or inhibiting our own thoughts and feelings to consider the perspectives of others; cognitive flexibility to see a situation in different ways; and reflection, or the ability to consider someone else’s thinking alongside our own.
Although perspective taking is rarely on lists of essential skills for children to acquire, research makes it clear that it should be.
The following articles are about Perspective Taking:
The Story’s the Thing
May 07, 2010
My mother was and still is an inveterate teller of tall tales, especially in conversation with children. She delights in the wide-eyed fascination of children with all things fantastic, and decided very early in her career as a mother that it was part of her job to keep the eyes of her own children and those of any children who accidentally wandered into range of hearing as wide as possible.
Accordingly, I grew up in a home in which it seemed entirely possible that there were sea creatures living in the plumbing and gnomes hiding in the closets. There were fairies and elves and imps and other magical creatures in the woods behind our house, and they lived in harmony with the animals there – the squirrels and birds that I saw every day, and the raccoons and skunks that I saw less often but knew well from the tracks in our backyard, tracks that my mother was very careful to point out and explain as evidence of the late-night forest creature moondances that occurred a few times each month. I knew that the forest creatures maintained harmony in their community through the frequent town-hall meetings that they held in a mossy stump – I knew this because my mother showed me exactly where they all sat during these meetings and held up various broken twigs and branches (used as benches) as evidence. I knew that I should never, ever pick toadstools, because if I did so I would be destroying the shelter of the littlest creatures of the forest.
I also knew that my sister and I came from a cabbage patch, and that if we unscrewed our bellybuttons, our bums would fall off. When I got old enough to start doubting these tales, I would confront my mother upon each telling: are you telling me a story?
Of course I am, my darling, she'd reply. But that doesn't mean that I'm not telling you the truth.
read moreAs baby steps become giant leaps
May 03, 2010
By Julie Marsh
My younger daughter lost her first tooth last week.
This is the same daughter who will start kindergarten in August, who’s been riding a bike without training wheels since Thanksgiving, who proudly identifies sight words and spends hours painstakingly creating works of art with any craft supplies she can find. The same daughter who was a newborn when we moved to Colorado, who screamed instead of speaking for her first three years, who consistently hit developmental milestones late and drove me to bury my copies of “What to Expect…” on the basement bookshelves.
read moreWhy I Am Concerned About Learning
April 16, 2010
by Ellen Galinsky
Bedtime Battles
March 07, 2010
A Parent's Perspective
Bedtime is always a battle these days. Analia usually finds any excuse to stay awake for “just a little bit” longer. After we’ve read a few books, I announce it’s time for “nighty-night.” She says, “We can read three more books and then I can go to bed—is that a great idea?” It’s late, I’m sleepy, and I grow increasingly frustrated with this game.
read moreReducing Aggression in Children
March 01, 2010
By Ellen Galinsky
Last week, I wrote about preventing aggression in young children, but what about reducing violence when it has already flared up?
Several years ago, Families and Work Institute (FWI) conducted a nationally representative study of young people in the fifth through the twelfth grades on this issue. Our findings—as always when we study young people’s views—were surprising and enormously helpful.
We found that although much public discussion about aggression has focused on extreme violence, such as school shootings, the largest proportion of young people talk about teasing that goes beyond being playful; about cruel put-downs and gossip; and about rejections as very real aggression to them.
This emotional aggression is very much a part of young people’s lives. In fact, two-thirds of young people (66%) have been teased or gossiped about in a mean way at least once in the past month and 25% have had this experience five times or more.
This is not to say that other kinds of aggression are unimportant—almost one third (32%) has been bullied at least once and 12% have been bullied five times or more in the past month; 46% of young people have been hit, shoved, kicked or tripped at least once and 18% have experienced this five times or more in the past month. Finally, one in 12 has experienced extreme violence.
Young people focus on emotional aggression as the trigger for other kinds of aggression—and this insight is echoed in the seminal studies of Larry Aber of New York University.
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