Date of Award

Spring 5-2022

Document Type

Capstone

Degree Name

Bachelor of Arts (BA)

Department/Program

Forensic Psychology

Language

English

First Advisor or Mentor

Kelly McWilliams

Second Reader

Ella Merriwether

Third Advisor

Evan Mandery

Abstract

This study builds on McWilliams (et al., 2019) by analyzing temporal bias among children when making relative temporal judgments using recurring landmarks (e.g., birthday, holidays). Previous research has demonstrated that children display a prospective bias when making these judgments, meaning they tend to date things based on the future occurrence of the landmark (E.g, “it’s ten months until my birthday”) (McWilliams et al., 2019). Adults, by contrast, make relative judgments with landmarks based on the most proximate occurrence of the landmark. In other words, they do not prefer the future or the past (Merriwether et al., under review). Additionally, recent research suggests that, in legal settings, testimony that is consistent with the prospective bias is seen as less credible than when it follows adult patterns of temporal understanding. The present study aims to expand on this line of research by examining children’s open-ended explanations to these questions, in an effort to obtain a better understanding of how children think about relative judgments.

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