Summary: Overimitation — the tendency to copy unnecessary or irrelevant actions — has been well documented in preschoolers but has been little studied in infants under two years old. A recent Concordia University study tested 16–21-month-old children and found that overimitation was infrequent in this age group and did not appear to be motivated by a desire to affiliate with people who seem similar to them.
At the same time, other forms of imitation linked to memory and to understanding others’ intentions were clearly present in these toddlers, indicating that basic imitative abilities emerge earlier than the social motivations that underpin overimitation.
Key Facts:
- Early emergence of imitation: Children under two copy actions, but overimitation — copying irrelevant steps — is uncommon and not tied to in-group preference at this age.
- Memory and intention link: The study found a strong relationship between elicited imitation (a memory-based task) and imitation of unfulfilled intentions (where an experimenter fails to complete an action).
- Developmental trajectory: Evidence from later research suggests that overimitation connected to social identity appears after age four, pointing to a developmental progression in social motivations for copying.
Source: Concordia University
Humans are inherently social beings, more so than other primates.
From early childhood, people seek acceptance from their social groups. Research with preschoolers has shown that imitating adult behaviour is a key route to learning new skills, absorbing cultural practices, and building social bonds. One distinctive pattern of imitation is overimitation, where a learner faithfully reproduces actions that are unnecessary for achieving a goal. While researchers have documented overimitation in three- to five-year-olds, less is known about whether infants under two show the same tendency.
A new study by researchers at Concordia University, published in Frontiers in Developmental Psychology, tested whether overimitation appears in infancy and whether it is linked to social affiliation or to other forms of imitation related to cognition and memory.
“The literature suggests that a person — even an adult — might overimitate because they want to affiliate with the person demonstrating the actions,” says Marilyne Dragon, the study’s lead author and a PhD student at the Cognitive and Language Development Lab. “They want to show they are like them.”
The study’s findings indicate that 16–21-month-old children produced few unnecessary actions and that their behaviour was not influenced by a preference for someone similar to themselves. In contrast, imitation tied to remembering demonstrated sequences and completing actions that an adult failed to finish were clearly related, suggesting that basic memory and intention-based imitation are in place by this age.
Memory and social cognition linked
The researchers tested 73 children with a mean age just over 18 months. Each child completed four structured tasks, each designed to measure a distinct imitative ability or preference. In every case an experimenter demonstrated the activity and the child’s responses were scored.
In the overimitation task, an experimenter opened a box to reveal a toy using a three-step sequence that included one irrelevant action. The elicited imitation task, which assesses memory for demonstrated actions, required the child to reproduce a three-step routine — for example, tucking a teddy to bed with a pillow and blanket. The unfulfilled intentions task involved the experimenter attempting but failing to complete a simple action (such as placing a string of beads into a cup), after which the child was given the opportunity to finish the action. Finally, an in-group preference task tested social affiliation: children watched a video of a woman and a robot each handling an identical plush toy, and the child was later given the choice to reach for the toy presented as if offered by either the woman or the robot.
Only performance on the elicited imitation and the unfulfilled intentions tasks showed a clear and significant correlation. There was no evident association between overimitation and a preference for the social in-group cue provided by the woman versus the robot.
“We suspect that a link between overimitation and in-group preference exists but emerges later in development,” Dragon adds, noting that laboratory findings from older children indicate such a connection becomes clearer with age. By around four and a half years, children who overimitate more often also tend to prefer peers who share their gender or ethnicity, suggesting that overimitation eventually becomes tied to information about group membership.
Co-author Diane Poulin-Dubois, a professor in the Department of Psychology, emphasizes that these results point to a developmental pattern: while basic imitative and cognitive skills are present in the second year of life, the social motivations that drive overimitation appear to mature later.
Dragon recommends that parents and educators be mindful that young children will copy adult behaviours — sometimes including unnecessary actions. “Children will mimic and reproduce actions that aren’t needed to reach a goal, so it is useful to encourage critical thinking and to model efficient, intentional actions when possible,” she says.
Funding: This research was supported by an Insight Grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.
About this child bonding and psychology research news
Author: Patrick Lejtenyi
Source: Concordia University
Contact: Patrick Lejtenyi – Concordia University
Image: Image credit: Neuroscience News
Original Research: Open access.
“I wanna be like you: testing the link between social affiliation and overimitation in infancy” by Marilyne Dragon et al., Frontiers in Developmental Psychology
Abstract
“I wanna be like you”: testing the link between social affiliation and overimitation in infancy
Introduction: Imitation is a primary mechanism for how children learn new skills and acquire cultural knowledge. Overimitation — copying actions that are not necessary to achieve an outcome — may reflect social motivations such as affiliation with the demonstrator. The mechanisms and developmental timeline for overimitation remain uncertain.
Methods: We tested 16- to 21-month-old children using four tasks: an infant-adapted overimitation task, an elicited imitation task (memory-based), an unfulfilled intentions imitation task, and an in-group preference task used as a direct measure of social affiliation. We predicted associations among imitation tasks, with a weaker connection to overimitation, and that in-group preference would relate more strongly to overimitation than to the other imitation measures.
Results and discussion: The findings revealed a significant association between elicited imitation and imitation of unfulfilled intentions, but no link between overimitation and in-group preference in this age group. To our knowledge, this is among the first studies to explore overimitation in infancy while attempting to relate it to other forms of imitation and to a separate, direct measure of social affiliation.