The mediating effect of cognitive development on children's worry elaboration

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Abstract

The present study investigated how developmentally determined cognitive mechanisms, holding theoretical links to the worry process, mediate the relationship between Age and Worry Elaboration in children. Sixty-four children aged 3–7 (M = 5.58, SD = 1.28) were presented with a Conservation of Liquid task assessing their Cognitive Development (specifically Concrete Operational Skills), a false-belief task to measure possession of Belief–Desire Theory of Mind, and a task measuring the ability to acknowledge multiple possibilities. The ability to elaborate on potential negative outcomes was assessed using a Worry Elaboration task. Mediation analysis revealed that all three variables significantly mediated the relationship between Age and Worry Elaboration. A multiple mediation model is presented in which Concrete Operational Skills, Belief–Desire Theory of Mind and Multiple Possibilities understanding mediate the relationship between Age and Worry Elaboration.

Highlights

► The results explain why children's ability to worry increases with age. ► General cognitive development mediated the relationship between age and worry. ► Mental state understanding mediated the relationship between age and worry. ► Understanding multiple outcomes mediated the relationship between age and worry.

Section snippets

Participants

Out of sixty-eight participants recruited, sixty-four participants (31 boys and 33 girls) between 3 and 7 years of age (M = 5.58, SD = 1.28) completed the study. This age range was appropriate because children typically pass false-belief tasks around four years old (Frye & Moore, 1991), acquire the capacity to understand multiple possibilities around five to six years (Beck et al., 2006), and understand conservation tasks at around seven (Berk, 2006), thus building a step by step account of the

Performance on tasks

Table 1 illustrates by age the frequency and percent of children who passed and failed on Sally–Ann and Conservation tasks. Table 2 shows mean and range of Worry Elaboration and Multiple Possibilities Understanding scores. Table 1 shows the majority of 3 year olds fail both the Sally–Ann and Conservation tasks (88%) with an improvement beginning at 5 years old, with the pass rate at 59% and 76% respectively. 7 year olds had the best performance on both tasks (pass rate being 72% and 94%). This

Discussion

This study aimed to investigate the effects of cognitive development (specifically Concrete Operational Skills), Belief–Desire Theory of Mind and Multiple Possibilities Understanding on the relationship between Age and Worry Elaboration in children between the ages of 3–7. Analyses revealed significant indirect effects of Cognitive Development, BDToM and MPU on the relationship between Age and the process of elaborating on possible negative outcomes. As our hypothesis predicted, this indicates

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