| This work examines young children's natural-kind categorization. Although ample evidence suggests that preschoolers' categorization is not limited to perceptual similarity, certain experimental findings seem to indicate an over-reliance on perceptual information in young children. In the object-transformation task six-year-olds display a strong tendency to categorize transformed natural objects based on their superficial appearance, not their original identity. For example, children claim that painting a horse with stripes makes it a zebra. Six studies with four-year-old children presented here examined the nature of children's failure on the transformation task. Studies 1--2 tested the hypothesis that children categorize transformed objects based on perceived intent behind the transformation, as both children and adults do when categorizing artifacts. We compared children's categorization of intentionally and accidentally transformed objects, and found no evidence to confirm this hypothesis, for children tended to categorize objects based on appearance, whether the transformation was intentional or accidental. Studies 3--4 tested the hypothesis that children respond non-literally to the categorization question, because the pragmatics of the task invite a non-literal, appearance-based answer, in the way that being asked to categorize a statue invites a response based on its appearance, rather than its real category membership. We found that an elaborated wording of the question, one that made it clear that a literal, reality-based answer was called for (e.g. "Is it really a zebra, or does it just look like a zebra?"), eliminated four-year-olds' tendency to respond based on appearance, confirming the non-literal hypothesis. Studies 5--6 provided further support for the non-literal account by demonstrating that children also categorize costumed and pretending agents non-literally, based on appearance or pretend identity, in response to the standard set-up and wording used in the transformation task, despite knowing the distinction between real and pretend or dress-up object identity. These findings are consistent with the view that young children's object categorization is not dominated by perceptual information, and is influenced by rudimentary essentialist intuitions. Children's response to the transformation task demonstrates the readiness with which they use kind terms to make non-literal statements expressing notions like resemblance in response to the pragmatic demands of a given situation. |
