What Doesn't Go Without Saying: Communication, Induction, and Exploration

Abstract

Although prior research on the development of causal reasoning has focused on inferential abilities within the individual child, causal learning often occurs in a social and communicative context. In this paper, we review recent research from our laboratory and look at how linguistic communication may influence children's causal reasoning. First, we present a study suggesting that toddlers only treat spontaneously occurring predictive relationships as if they might support intervention if the events are described with causal language. Second, we show that presenting causal hypotheses as contrastive beliefs, rather than neutrally, improves kindergarteners' ability to provide evidence for their causal inferences. Third, we provide a rational analysis suggesting that stronger inductive inferences are licensed when evidence is presented pedagogically than nonpedagogically; preschoolers are sensitive to this with the consequence that, for better and worse, instruction constrains exploration. In each case study, we discuss the implication that language has a unique role in changing children's interpretation of evidence for causal relationships.