Role-taking theory
Role-taking theory is the social-psychological concept that one of the most important factors in facilitating social cognition in children is the growing ability to understand others’ feelings and perspectives, an ability that emerges as a result of general cognitive growth. Part of this process requires that children come to realize that others’ views may differ from their own. Role-taking ability involves understanding the cognitive and affective aspects of another person's point of view, and differs from perceptual perspective taking, which is the ability to recognize another person's visual point of view of the environment. Furthermore, albeit some mixed evidence on the issue, role taking and perceptual perspective taking seem to be functionally and developmentally independent of each other.
Robert Selman is noted for emphasizing the importance of this theory within the field of cognitive development. He argues that a matured role-taking ability allows us to better appreciate how our actions will affect others, and if we fail to develop the ability to role take, we will be forced to erroneously judge that others are behaving solely as a result of external factors. One of Selman's principal additions to the theory has been an empirically supported developmental theory of role-taking ability.
Social cognitive research on children's thoughts about others’ perspectives, feelings, and behaviors has emerged as one of the largest areas of research in the field. Role-taking theory can provide a theoretical foundation upon which this research can rest and be guided by and has relations and applications to numerous other theories and topics.
Selman's developmental theory
developed his developmental theory of role-taking ability based on four sources. The first is the work of M. H. Feffer, and Feffer and Gourevitch, which related role-taking ability to Piaget's theory of social decentering, and developed a projective test to assess children's ability to decenter as they mature. The second is the research of John H. Flavell, which studied children's growing abilities to judge other people's conceptual and perceptual perspectives. The third is the developmental ideas of differentiation, whereupon one learns to distinguish his/her perspective from the perspectives of others, and integration, the ability to relate one's perspective to the perspectives of others. The final source of influence comes from Selman's own previous research where he assessed children's ability to describe the different perspectives of characters in a story.One example of Selman's stories is that of Holly and her father. Children are told about Holly, an avid 8-year-old tree climber. One day, Holly falls off a tree, but does not hurt herself. Holly's father sees this and makes Holly promise that she will stop climbing trees, and Holly promises. Later, however, Holly and her friends meet Shawn, a boy whose kitten is stuck in a tree. Holly is the only one amongst her friends who can climb trees well enough to save Shawn's kitten, who may fall at any moment, but she remembers the promise she made with her father. Selman then goes on to ask children about the perspectives of Holly and her father, and each stage is associated with typical responses.
Stages
Level 0: Egocentric Role Taking
Level 0 is characterized by two lacking abilities. The first is the failure to distinguish perspectives. More specifically, the child is unable to distinguish between his perspective, including his perspective on why a social action occurred, and that of others. The second ability the child lacks is relating perspectives.In the Holly dilemma, children tend to respond that Holly will save the kitten and that the father will not mind Holly's disobedience because he will be happy and he likes kittens. In actuality, the child is displaying his/her inability to separate his/her liking for kittens from the perspectives of Holly and her father.
Level 1: Subjective role taking
At level 1, children now recognize that they and others in a situation may have different information available to them, and thus may differ in their views. In other words, children have matured in differentiation. The child still significantly lacks integration ability, however: he/she cannot understand that his views are influenced by the views of others, and vice versa, ad infinitum. In addition, the child believes that the sole reason for differing social perspectives is because of different information, and nothing else.In the Holly dilemma, when asked if the father would be angry if he found out that Holly climbed the tree again, children might respond, “If he didn’t know why she climbed the tree, he would be angry. But if he knew why she did it, he would realize that she had a good reason,” not recognizing that the father may still be angry, regardless of her wanting to save the kitten, because of his own values, such as his concern for his daughter's safety.
Level 2: Self-reflective role taking
The child's differentiation ability matures at this level enough so that he/she understands that people can also differ in their social perspectives because of their particularly held and differing values and set of purposes. In turn, the child is able to better put him/herself in the position of another person. In terms of integration, the child can now understand that others think about his/her point of view too. This allows the child to predict how the other person might react to the child's behaviour. What is still lacking, however, is for the child to be able to consider another person's point of view and another person's point of view of the child simultaneously.In the Holly dilemma, when children are asked if Holly will climb the tree, they will typically respond, “Yes. She knows that her father will understand why she did it.” This indicates the child is considering the father's perspective in light of Holly's perspective; however, when asked if the father would want Holly to climb the tree, children typically respond that he would not. This shows that the child is solely considering the father's point of view and his worry for Holly's safety.
Level 3: Mutual role taking
In level 3, the child can now differentiate his/her own perspective from the viewpoint likely for the average member of the group. In addition, the child can take the view of a detached third-person and view a situation from that perspective. In terms of integration, the child can now simultaneously consider his/her view of others and others’ view of the child, and the consequences of this feedback loop of perspectives in terms of behaviour and cognition.In describing the result of the Holly dilemma, the child may take the perceptive of a detached third party, responding that “Holly wanted to get the kitten because she likes kittens, but she knew that she wasn’t supposed to climb trees. Holly’s father knew that Holly had been told not to climb trees, but he couldn’t have known about .”
Level 4: Societal role taking
At level 4, the adolescent now considers others’ perspectives with reference to the social environment and culture the other person comes from, assuming that the other person will believe and act in accord to their society's norms and values.When asked if Holly deserves to be punished for her transgression, adolescents typically respond that Holly should not as her father should understand that we need to humanely treat animals.
Evidence for Selman's Stages
Three studies have been conducted to assess Selman's theory, all of which having shown support for his developmental outline of role-taking ability progression. Selman conducted the first study of his own theory using 60 middle-class children from ages 4 to 6. In this experiment, the children were asked to predict and explain their predictions about another child's behaviour in a certain situation. The child participants were given situational information not available to the child they were making behavioural and cognitive predictions about. Results implied a stage progression of role taking ability as a function of age, as theorized by Selman.In a second assessment of the theory, Selman and D. F. Byrne interviewed 40 children, ages 4, 6, 8, and 10, on two socio-moral dilemmas. Children were required to discuss the perspectives of different characters in each dilemma, and results again showed that role taking ability progressed through stages as a function of age.
The third study assessing Selman's theory was a 5-year longitudinal study of 41 male children on their role taking ability. Results showed that 40 of the 41 children interviewed followed the stages as outlined by Selman and none skipped over a stage.
Relation to other topics
Piaget's theory of cognitive development
stressed the importance of play in children, especially play that involves role taking. He believed that role taking play in children promotes a more mature social understanding by teaching children to take on the roles of others, allowing them to understand that different people can have differing perspectives. In addition, Piaget argued that good solutions to interpersonal conflicts involve compromise which arises out of our ability to consider the points of view of others.Two of Piaget's fundamental concepts have primarily influenced role taking theory:
- egocentrism, the mode of thinking that characterizes preoperational thinking, which is the child's failure to consider the world from other points of view.
- decentration, the mode of thinking that characterizes operational thinking, which is the child's growing ability to perceive the world with more than one perspective in mind.
Evidence that Piaget's cognitive theories can be applied to the interpersonal aspects of role-taking theory comes from two sources. The first is empirical evidence that children's ability to role take is correlated to their IQ and performance on Piagetian tests. Secondly, the two theories have been conceptually linked in that Selman's role-taking stages correspond to Piaget's cognitive development stages, where preoperational children are at level 1 or 2, concrete operators are at level 3 or 4, and formal operators are at level 4 or 5 of Selman's stages. Given this relation, M. H. Feffer, as well as Feffer and V. Gourevitch, have argued that social role-taking is an extension of decentering in the social sphere. Selman has argued this same point, also noting that the growth of role-taking ability is brought on by the child's decreased egocentrism as he/she ages.