Prospects and challenges in the use of puppets in developmental psychology: Royal road to the child’s mind or a dead end?

Abstract

In order to examine young children, developmental science has relied extensively on puppets, dolls, and animated stimuli. While some scholars regarded this as a royal road to the child’s mind and competencies, others conceived of it as a dead end. This article introduces the debate on the use of puppets and other simplified stimuli in developmental psychology. It presents key theoretical and methodological arguments that are offered for both sides. In addition, it introduces a special issue that has collected theoretical and empirical contributions on how children process puppets, dolls, and animated stimuli as well as to illustrate the benefits and challenges of their use in developmental research. Finally, the article suggests avenues for further research.