Sticking to the Evidence? A Behavioral and Computational Case Study of Micro-Theory Change in the Domain of Magnetism.
We present 4- and 5-year-olds with two different simplified magnet-learning tasks. Children appropriately constrain their beliefs to two hypotheses following ambiguous but informative evidence. Following a critical intervention, they learn the correct theory. In the second study, children infer the correct number of categories given no information about the possible causal laws. Children's hypotheses in these tasks are explained as rational inferences within a Bayesian computational framework.
PMID: 31446650 [PubMed - in process]
Source: Cognitive Science - Category: Neuroscience Authors: Bonawitz E, Ullman TD, Bridgers S, Gopnik A, Tenenbaum JB Tags: Cogn Sci Source Type: research
More News: Children | Learning | Legislation | Neuroscience | Science | Study | Universities & Medical Training