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. 2022 Sep 15;17(9):e0274460.
doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0274460. eCollection 2022.

Stop and think: Additional time supports monitoring processes in young children

Sophie Wacker  1 , Claudia M Roebers  1
Affiliations

Stop and think: Additional time supports monitoring processes in young children

Sophie Wacker et al. PLoS One. .

Abstract

When children evaluate their certainty, monitoring is often inaccurate. Even though young children struggle to estimate their confidence, existing research shows that monitoring skills are developing earlier than expected. Using a paired associates learning task with integrated monitoring, we implemented a time window to-"Stop and Think"-before children generated their answers and evaluated their confidence in the chosen response. Results show that kindergarten and second grade children in the-"Stop and Think"-condition have higher monitoring accuracy than the control group. Implementing a time window thus seems to support children in their evaluation of different certainty levels. Relating individual differences in independently measured inhibitory control skills revealed a correlation between monitoring and inhibition for kindergarteners.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Figures

Fig 1
Fig 1. Distribution of the discrimination score separated for condition and age.
Note. Boxplot for the dependent variable discrimination score, separated for Age (Kindergartners vs. Second Graders), and Condition (Control Group (CG) vs. Experimental Group (EG)). Whiskers represent 1.5 * interquartile range.
Fig 2
Fig 2. Distribution of the bias index separated for condition and age.
Note. Boxplot for the dependent variable bias index, separated for Age (Kindergartners vs. Second Graders), and Condition (Control Group (CG) vs. Experimental Group (EG)). Whiskers represent 1.5 * interquartile range.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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