TY - JOUR PY - 2017// TI - Children's perception of action boundaries and how it affects their climbing behavior JO - Journal of experimental child psychology A1 - Croft, James L. A1 - Pepping, Gert-Jan A1 - Button, Chris A1 - Chow, Jia-Yi SP - 134 EP - 146 VL - 166 IS - N2 - There are some concerns that children today may be less calibrated to their action capabilities because of the "risk-free" culture that has proliferated during recent decades. This study investigated the extent to which judgments of reaching affordances presented in different directions (i.e., overhead, diagonal, and horizontal) are related to children's climbing behavior on a climbing wall. A sample of 30 schoolchildren from 6 to 11years old (20 boys and 10 girls) estimated maximum reach and grasp distances and subsequently attempted to climb across an indoor climbing wall. Children who perceived the extents of their reach more accurately completed the climb more often and more quickly. Judgments in the primary directions of climbing locomotion (horizontal and diagonal) were better predictors of success than vertical judgments. Judgments about whether objects are reachable and graspable are complex and influenced by various dynamic factors (including perceptual-motor calibration), and as such different levels of accuracy are likely in different reaching directions. It appears that young children are relatively sensitive to their action boundaries for climbing and, therefore, may be able to make informed decisions themselves about whether a surface is climbable.

Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Language: en

LA - en SN - 0022-0965 UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jecp.2017.07.012 ID - ref1 ER -