Development of Knowledge about the Appearance-Reality Distinction

7 studies of the acquisition of knowledge about the appearance-reality distinction suggest the following course of development. Many 3-year-olds seem to possess little or no understanding of the distinction. They fail the simplest Appearance-Reality (AR) tasks and are unresponsive to efforts to teach them the distinction. Skill in solving simple AR tasks is highly correlated with skill in solving simple perceptual Perspective-taking (PT) tasks; this suggests the hypothesis that the ability to represent the selfsame stimulus in two different, seemingly incompatible ways may underlie both skills. Children of 6-7 years have acquired both skills but nevertheless find it very difficult to reflect on and talk about such appearance-reality concepts as "looks like," "really and truly," and "looks different from the way it really and truly is." In contrast, children of 11-12 years, and to an even greater degree college students, possess a substantial body of rich, readily accessible, and explicit knowledge in this area.