Volu m e II - Purdue University Calumet

“Do kids have the right to disobey sometimes? Like when?”: this question seemed to be the breaking point
for the seven-year-old participant. Up until this point, all of her answers implied that she was wellrehearsed,
aware, and insightful of the topic—possibly intrinsically so. Up until this point, it seemed as
though the responses of the seven-year-old had completely proven the researcher‟s hypothesis wrong, and a
seven-year-old child is indeed able to understand the sexual nature of the vignette and to understand when
an adult has proper authority and when s/he does not. The seven-year-old child had validated all of her
“why‟s” with logical, seemingly insightful responses. Yet, for the final question: “Do kids have the right to
disobey sometimes? Like when?” the child gives a simple answer: no. Unfortunately, when prompted to
generalize her overall experience of the vignette—the exact resistance strategy which carries hope of
prevention of sexual abuse for younger children—the child fails to do so. It seems that without a leading or
suggestive question, the child is still limited in her cognitive ability to make an assessment of a complex
situation. The mark of being able to make logic of and properly assess something is evaluation: in this case,
being able to generalize conclusions derived from assessment. The child fails to do so.
The researcher‟s hypothesis predicted that the older children would have significantly more
discerning responses—reflecting a deeper understanding and a higher cognitive ability.
Two older children were interviewed. The first participant, a male of age ten, assumed without hesitation
that the problem in the story was that Tommy had lost his puppy. He believed that Tommy should “put up
signs saying „lost dog,‟ so people can find his dog.” The participant believed that Tommy will “go try to find
[the man‟s] dog, because he loves his dog.” Likewise, the child also believed that Tommy should look at the
picture of the puppy, as the man had instructed him, “because it‟s a lost puppy”—and therefore it was
“okay” for the man to tell Tommy to look at the picture. However, the ten-year-old boy did not believe
that a man walking down the street has the right to tell children what to do because “it‟s not right. That‟s
just being mean.”
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