Changes in children's attentional engagement were assessed as a function of
their exposure to "teachers" who differed in perceived power and the commu
nication style that is associated with perceived power. In Study 1, "teache
rs" (women assigned to an instructional role) were selected on the basis of
their perceived power; low-power women were more Likely than high-power wo
men to display communication ambiguity. Children responded to low-power wom
en with low levels of (1) autonomic orienting (consistent with low attentio
n) and (2) high errors on a cognitively demanding task (mental arithmetic).
Attentional disengagement was found to be mediated by the ambiguous commun
ication style of low-power adults. Ln Study 2, the "teacher" was a confeder
ate who systematically varied the facial and vocal ambiguity of her instruc
tions. Children showed the lowest levels of orienting and the highest level
of errors when the "teacher" was ambiguous in both face and voice. Results
were interpreted as showing that adult ambiguity (naturally occurring or e
xperimentally produced) leads to reductions in children's attentional engag
ement.