Learning From Surprise in Childhood: Empirical, Methodological, and Theoretical Advances

Session Type: Paper Symposium

Abstract

The notion of surprise is central to theories of learning across many disciplines. A widespread view is that learning occurs, or is enhanced, when learners detect a difference between predicted and actual outcomes (i.e., prediction error). However, recent findings suggest young children’s learning from surprise goes far beyond this simple form of reinforcement learning. Here we bring together an international team of researchers to present the latest empirical, methodological, and theoretical advances in early surprise-based learning.

Study 1 shows that children have an “exploratory bias” that allows them to detect unexpected changes even better than adults, maximizing opportunities to learn from surprise. Study 2 combines pupillometry with behavioral experiments, finding that the process of actively generating predictions enhances school-aged children’s pupillary surprise and facilitates revision of naïve theories. Study 3 takes a computational approach to provide a Bayesian model of surprise-induced learning, characterizing how prior beliefs and conflicting evidence elicit surprise and belief-updating. Beyond learning from one’s own surprise, Study 4 reveals how children engage in surprise-based social learning; even preschoolers use others’ surprise as “vicarious prediction error” to guide their own exploration and discovery.

These findings shed light on what makes young children exceptional learners: They make theory-based predictions to explore the world, and use surprise to revise their beliefs in both individual and social learning contexts. Featuring researchers who span across multiple disciplines, nationalities, and career stages, our symposium will provide novel insights into the cognitive, physiological, and social aspects of surprise-induced learning and its development.

Sub Unit

• Cognitive Processes

Chair

• Yang Wu, Stanford University

Individual Presentations

• The Exploration Advantage: Children’s Bias Towards Exploration Leads Them to Find Information Adults Miss - Presenting Author: Emily Sarah Sumner, University of California - Berkeley; Non-Presenting Author: Amy Li, University of New South Wales, Australia; Non-Presenting Author: Andrew Perfors; Non-Presenting Author: Brett Hayes, University of New South Wales, Australia; Non-Presenting Author: Danielle Navarro, University of New South Wales, Australia; Non-Presenting Author: Barbara W Sarnecka, University of California - Irvine; Non-Presenting Author: Celeste Kidd, University of California - Berkeley

• Inducing Surprise in Children Promotes Theory Revision - Presenting Author: Garvin Brod, DIPF & Goethe University Frankfurt; Non-Presenting Author: Maria Theobald, Leibniz Institute for Research and Information in Education

• Theory-Based Bayesian Models of Elementary School Children’s Pupillary Surprise - Presenting Author: Joseph Colantonio, Rutgers University - Newark; Non-Presenting Author: Igor Bascandziev, Rutgers University - Newark; Non-Presenting Author: Maria Theobald, Leibniz Institute for Research and Information in Education; Non-Presenting Author: Garvin Brod, DIPF & Goethe University Frankfurt; Non-Presenting Author: Elizabeth Bonawitz, Rutgers University - Newark

• Preschool-Aged Children Jointly Consider Others’ Surprise and Prior Knowledge to Decide When to Explore - Presenting Author: Yang Wu, Stanford University; Non-Presenting Author: Hyowon Gweon, Stanford University