Children’s Expectations About the Stability of Others’ Knowledge and Preference States

• In Event: Poster Session 01
  In Poster Session: PS 01 Topic - Cognitive Processes

Abstract

An extensive literature suggests that sensitivity to own and others’ epistemic states is evident early in life. For instance, preschool-aged children understand that knowledge tends to increase with age (Atance & Caza, 2018; Taylor, Cartwright, & Bowden, 1991) and vary across individuals depending on their expertise (Jaswal & Neely, 2006; Lutz & Keil, 2002). Here, we investigate children’s intuitions about the stability of others’ knowledge states across time and place and compare them to their intuitions about the stability of others’ preference states.

Participants were 44 children (28 4 year-olds and 16 6 year-olds), who were tested individually over Zoom. Participants were randomly assigned to the Knowledge or the Preference condition. On each of the four trials, participants were introduced to a drawing of a child and an unfamiliar item that the target knew (Knowledge Condition) or liked (Preference Condition). Participants were then asked to guess whether the target child would still know or like these items if he/she moved to a new city and when he/she grew up to be an adult. Once children answered, they were also asked whether they were very sure or a little sure of their answer. The things target children knew or liked were made up, thus unfamiliar to all children. They included a song, a dance, a story and a game.

Children’s answers were converted to scores with higher scores indicating stronger expectations about stability. These scores were submitted to a mixed ANOVA with Inference Type (Place vs. Time) as the within subjects and Age Group (4 vs. 6 years) and Condition (Knowledge vs. Preference) as the between subjects variables. We found a significant main effect of Inference Type (p = .001), a marginal interaction between Inference Type, Condition and Age Group (p = .051) and a significant interaction between Condition and Age Group (p = .029). Follow up analyses showed that 4 year-olds expected knowledge to be stable across place (t(14) = 2.78, p = .015), but not across time (p > .9). However, they expected preferences to be stable both across place (t(12) = 10.91, p < .001) and time (t(12) = 4.89, p < .001). Six year-olds, on the other hand, expected knowledge to be stable across both place (t(6) = 6.30, p = .001) and time (t(6) = 5.46, p = .002). Yet, they expected preferences to be stable across place (t(8) = 7.84, p < .001) but not across time (t(8) = 1.69, p = .12) (See Figure 1).

Data collection is ongoing, but the findings so far suggest an interesting developmental shift in children’s assumptions regarding the stability of others’ knowledge and preference states: Between the ages of 4 and 6, children come to think not only that preferences change, but also that knowledge lasts across time. Potential underlying mechanisms and implications of these findings concerning children’s communication and their learning will be discussed.

Authors

• Oya Serbest, University of California - Santa Barbara
  Presenting Author

• Duygu Yilmaz, Boğaziçi Üniversitesi (BOUN)
  Non-Presenting Author

• Mahmut Kurupinar, Boğaziçi Üniversitesi (BOUN)
  Non-Presenting Author

• Gaye Soley, Boğaziçi Üniversitesi (BOUN)
  Non-Presenting Author