Ella Todd
Research Mentor(s): Josephine Monahan
Mentor Department: Psychology
Authors: Ella Todd, Adaugo Ogbu, Josephine Monahan, David Menendez, Susan Gelman
Session: Session 4 (1:00pm – 1:50pm)
Presentation Type: Poster 60
Abstract
Illness can impact the lives of everyone, often starting at a young age, and children tend to lack education about how infections spread. However, past studies have shown that kids as young as preschoolers can reason with biology. Accordingly, we recognize a gap in the understanding of children’s cognitive processes, and this study aims to help narrow it by exploring how children think and learn about illness. The COVID-19 pandemic highlights the importance of public health education, particularly among children, who play a critical role in disease prevention and community health. Through proctored Zoom sessions, we are asking 216 children between the ages of 5-8 years old a series of questions about viruses before and after watching one of three educational videos; either a realistic, an anthropomorphic, or a control version. The videos provide clear and accessible information about illness and viral transmission, along with effective prevention strategies such as hygiene practices and vaccinations. The realistic and anthropomorphic versions detail the in-depth processes involved in COVID-19 transmission, but differ in their language and how they depict the viruses. The control version provides minimal detail about how the virus affects the body. Although data collection is still in progress, initial responses reveal a variety of misconceptions and areas of curiosity about viruses. Some post-video responses appear to demonstrate notable improvements in understanding, with many children providing more detailed and accurate answers. These observations suggest that child-friendly educational videos could be effective in enhancing children’s understanding of scientific concepts while addressing knowledge gaps. As a result, this study provides insights into areas where additional efforts are needed to improve health literacy from a young age. Future research could expand on this work by including a broader age range of participants and evaluating long-term knowledge retention to better inform public health education strategies.
