Imitativeness: A Trait or a Skill?

Abstract

Imitation has been dealt with in so many different ways by different subfields of psychology that it, in fact, may constitute a number of quite different conceptual phenomena, related only in that they all have the same name and somewhat similar external forms. Researchers on infant development, starting with Piaget himself, considered imitation an accomplishment, a developmental milestone to be achieved, a position that is, of course, supported by the findings that children's ability to imitate increasingly complex and novel models improves with age (e.g., Masur 1984&Ritz 1984; McCall, Parke, & Kavanaugh, 1977; Piaget, 1962). Many researchers in child language have viewed verbal imitation as exactly the opposite—the fallback strategy of the child whose language competence is unequal to the comprehension of incoming material (e.g., Leonard, Schwartz, Folger, Newhoff, & Wilcox, 1979). Thus, whereas imitating a maternal gesture was seen by Piaget as a reflection of the child's competence, imitation of a maternal utterance is seen by many in child language as an indication of failure to process or understand. Indeed, parents evidently share this view and often respond to child imitations of adult utterances with repetitions in somewhat simplified forms (Stine &Bohannon, 1983). Many child-language researchers have also noted the wide individual differences in tendency to imitate among children (see, e.g., Dunkeld, 1978; Field, 1982; Hayes & Watson, 1981; Heimann & Schaller, 1985; Masur, 1984), and have assumed furthermore that imitation is a behavior related to "imitativeness;' which is seen as something very like a personality trait, a characteristic of the child resulting in certain kinds of behavior under certain conditions. Thus, it has been hypothesized that imitativeness should relate to other relatively stable characteristics of the child, such as willingness to take risks, preference for holistic rather than analytic strategies, and a social/expressive style of language development (see, e.g.,Bates, Bretherton, & Snyder, 1988;K. Nelson, 1981).