Recent reviews have highlighted the tendency in the comparative literature to make claims about species' relative evolutionarily adaptive histories based on studies comparing different species tested with procedurally and methodologically different protocols. One particularly contentious area is the use of the object-choice task, used to measure an individual's ability to use referential cues, which is a core attribute of joint attention. We tested human children with versions of the object-choice task that have been previously used with dogs and nonhuman primates to see if manipulating the setup would lead to behavioral changes. In Study 1, we compared the responses of 18-month-olds and 36-month-olds when tested with and without a barrier. The presence of a barrier between the child and the reward did not suppress performance but did elicit more communicative behavior. Moreover, the barrier had a greater facilitating effect on the younger children, who displayed more communicative behavior in comparison with older children, who more frequently reached through the barrier in acts of direct prehension. In Study 2, we compared the behavior of 36-month-olds when the reward was within reaching distance (proximal) and when it was out of reach (distal). The children used index-finger points significantly more in the distal condition and grabbed more in the proximal condition, showing that they were making spatial judgments about the accessibility of the reward rather than just grabbing per se. We discuss the implications of these within-species differences in behavioral responses for cross-species comparisons. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

中文翻译：

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婴儿和幼儿（智人）的参考问题空间变化的影响：对跨物种比较的启示。

最近的评论强调了比较文献中基于根据程序和方法上不同的协议测试不同物种的研究对物种相对进化适应性历史做出主张的趋势。一个特别引起争议的领域是使用对象选择任务，该任务用于衡量个人使用参考提示的能力，这是共同注意的核心属性。我们使用对象选择任务的版本对人类儿童进行了测试，该版本先前已与狗和非人类灵长类动物一起使用，以查看操纵该设置是否会导致行为改变。在研究1中，我们比较了在有无障碍的情况下测试的18个月大和36个月大的反应。在儿童和奖励之间存在障碍并没有抑制表现，但确实引起了更多的交流行为。此外，与年长的孩子相比，障碍对年幼的孩子具有更大的促进作用，而年长的孩子则更经常地通过障碍直接采取行动，因此较年长的孩子表现出更多的交流行为。在研究2中，我们比较了36个月大的孩子在奖励在到达范围内（近端）和超出范围（远端）时的行为。孩子们在远端情况下使用食指的次数更多，而在近端情况下使用的次数更多，这表明他们正在对奖励的可及性进行空间判断，而不是仅仅抓住自己。我们讨论了这些物种内部差异对跨物种比较的行为反应的影响。（PsycINFO数据库记录（c）2020 APA，保留所有权利）。