Effect of social context on flexibility in 5-year-olds.

Abstract

This study covers cognitive flexibility in 5-year-olds. A block sorting task was used to test 53 Singaporean preschoolers across three social contexts: individual, cooperative, and competitive. It was found that a competitive context best facilitated the block sorting task, with no significant differences found between cooperative and individual contexts, despite the large amount of research supporting the effectiveness of cooperation. Sorting complexity, which was the maximum of dimensions used in any one correct sort, did not differ across conditions, which suggested that all 5-year-olds tend to follow the same rules in sorting. The findings reveal that cooperation must be accompanied by interaction and discussion to facilitate task performance; otherwise, it will less useful than what past research suggests.