Developmental differences in part/whole identification

At issue in the present research was whether or not preschoolers are able to simultaneously perceive multiple aspects of an object. This issue was examined in 2 experiments in which 3-5-year-olds were asked to describe part/whole pictures (e.g., a "house made of crayons"). Prior developmental research has suggested that preschoolers typically fail to name both part and whole aspects of such pictures. In the present study, parts and wholes ranged from relatively "simple" to relatively "difficult" for preschoolers to identify and label. The results showed that even 3-year-olds frequently named both part and whole aspects of our "simple" pictures but were significantly less likely to name both aspects of more "difficult" pictures. Overall, the results suggest that multiple-aspect perception is available as early as 3 years of age, and that preschoolers' failure in previous studies to explicitly identify both part and whole aspects of the same object may reflect failure in verbal or metacognitive skills rather than in children's ability to perceive multiple aspects of an object.