Children's comprehension of deceptive points

This study investigated children's ability to comprehend deceptive point ge stures. Thirty 3-4 1/2-year-olds participated in a game in which a sticker was hidden under one of two containers. A confederate provided misleading c lues about the location of the sticker by either pointing co or placing a m arker on the container without the sticker. Across ages, children performed less well when the clue was the point than when it was the marker. They we re able to use che misleading marker cue, learning to look under the unmark ed container. However, they could not do this for che misleading point. The se results concur with chose from studies of point production (Carlson, Mos es & Hix, 1998) in indicating that deceptive pointing may be a misleading m easure of children's abilities. Ac a very early age children learn che comm unicative value of the point gesture. This knowledge may become so entrench ed chat children have difficulty interpreting points in a novel manner.