幼儿反事实推理的错误源分析

本研究选取57名3~5岁幼儿,考察了在两种选择和三种选择的反事实推理任务中儿童的表现以及是否出现现实错误。结果如下:无论在两种还是三种选择的反事实任务中,3岁组儿童的得分显著低于4岁和5岁组儿童,而4岁和5岁组儿童之间不存在显著差异;幼儿在反事实推理中的确会出现现实错误,但除此之外,幼儿在三种选择任务中也会选择现实和正确答案之外的第三个选项。由此可见,年幼儿童可能在抑制现实和建构反事实替代情境方面都存在困难,这尚需我们进一步探究。     

幼儿前提反事实推理的发展特点和影响因素

本研究选取90名3~5岁幼儿为被试,采用图片故事法和口语报告法测查幼儿前提反事实推理的发展特点以及结果性质和领域知识的影响。结果表明:(1)幼儿前提反事实推断数量随年龄而增多;(2)幼儿产生的减法式反事实推断数显著多于加法式,但上行和下行反事实推断数之间的差异不显著;(3)对反事实推断的影响因素方面,结果性质主效应不显著,领域知识主效应显著,两者存在交互作用,当控制语言能力后交互作用不显著。     

动机冲突下2~4岁幼儿反事实思维理解的发展

采用故事法, 考察在3种动机冲突下幼儿反事实思维理解的发展。结果表明：(1) 2岁幼儿的加法、减法反事实思维得分显著高于替代反事实思维。(2)在加法反事实任务中, 2岁幼儿显著低于4岁幼儿;在减法反事实任务中, 3个年龄组得分有显著性差异。(3)在趋避冲突下, 加法与减法反事实得分都显著高于替代反事实。(4)在结果反事实理解任务中, 随着年龄增长, 幼儿结果反事实思维理解能力有显著提高。     

幼儿反事实推理的发展特点及影响因素

本研究以北京某幼儿园94名幼儿为被试,采用图片故事法和口语报告相结合的方式,考查了幼儿反事实堆理能力的发展特点及影响因素。结果表明：（1）4、5岁幼儿的表现明显好于3岁幼儿,但是4、5岁幼儿之间没有明显差异;（2）问题形式和因果链对反事实推理的影响上具有交互作用;（3）领域知识在各年龄阶段上对反事实推理的影响存在差异。     

幼儿非形式推理能力的发生与发展

针对在儿童非形式推理能力发生研究中评价标准不一和研究结果中发生年龄不同的问题,在论证并提出幼儿非形式推理发生评价标准的基础上,采用提示访谈法对333名3-6岁幼儿的非形式推理做了考察。结果显示:幼儿的我方推理普遍在3岁3个月～3岁9个月发生;他方推理普遍在4岁～4岁6个月发生;反驳推理普遍在4岁9个月～6岁发生。幼儿在推理过程中提出的理由数量随年龄的增长而增多,年龄差异显著,但无显著性别差异。研究中建立的评价指标体系可以有效测量幼儿非形式推理的发生和发展。     

儿童在错误信念任务上的知识偏差

采用3种任务考查儿童在错误信念（FB）推理中是否存在知识偏差。被试为60名3—5岁幼儿,结果表明,对于3岁及4岁儿童来说,FB任务是存在知识偏差的。知识偏差的大小与年龄呈负相关关系,3岁与4岁、4岁与5岁儿童的知识偏差的大小均有显著差异。     

4—6岁幼儿空间方位传递性推理能力的发展

该研究旨在探查4、5、6岁幼儿空间上下和前后方位传递性推理能力的发展水平及不同实验条件(一致、模糊、冲突)下儿童的传递性推理能力。为了尽量降低记忆对推理的影响,要求幼儿在前提呈现的条件下按前提方位关系进行传递性推理操作。被试为幼儿园4、5、6岁组儿童各24人,其中男女各半。主要结果表明：4岁幼儿开始萌发空间前后和上下方位的传递性推理能力;从4岁到6岁,“上下”方位传递性推理能力的发展优于“前后”方位;4—6岁幼儿还不能完全摆脱知觉干扰因素的影响,形成稳定的传递性推理能力。     

个体与群体情境下3～5岁幼儿延迟满足的实验研究

采用实验法以90名3~5岁的儿童为被试,探讨其在个体和群体情境中延迟满足的特点。研究结果表明:3~5岁幼儿的延迟满足能力存在着显著的年龄差异,随着年龄的增长而不断提高;3岁幼儿延迟满足能力较弱,而4、5岁的幼儿在这种能力上有了较明显的发展,但从整体上来看,幼儿阶段的延迟满足能力仍然很低;3~5岁幼儿的延迟满足能力在不同的情境、不同性别中不存在显著的差异。     

2.5—6岁儿童解决五项系列问题的研究

利用五项系列问题设计了5种情境研究2.5—6岁儿童的传递性关系推理,发现:(1)在未经训练的情况下,4岁组以下不具备这种能力,4—5岁幼儿的传递性关系推理能力开始萌芽,5—6岁是该能力的发展加速期,6岁组幼儿基本上具备了这种能力;在接受训练之后,2.5—3.5岁幼儿基本不具备这种能力,4岁组幼儿大致处于临界水平,5岁组以上已经基本具备。(2)比较句式理解失误和前提记忆不足均是幼儿推理失败的重要心理因素。(3)前提表达方式影响幼儿的推理成败。(4)与用三项系列问题作材料的研究相比,用五项系列问题作刺激所引起的推理能力表现得晚得多。     

规则顺序与规则类型对儿童规则推理的影响

学前儿童时期是各种推理能力产生和发展的重要时期。本研究采用Frye和Zelazo等（1996）所设计的“二进二出”装置,设置了规则顺序、规则类型的规则推理任务,采用个别实验法,研究了90名3～4岁儿童规则推理能力的发展。在本研究条件下,结果发现：1．当规则呈现顺序不同时,儿童规则推理成绩差异显著,先呈现哪个规则,则利用这个规则进行推理的成绩就较好;2．不同规则类型下儿童的推理成绩差异极其显著,竖直规则下的推理任务更容易;3．3．5～4岁是儿童二维合取规则推理能力发展的快速期。     

Being nice by choice: The effect of counterfactual reasoning on children's social evaluations

The ability to engage in counterfactual thinking (reason about what else could have happened) is critical to learning, agency, and social evaluation. However, not much is known about how individual differences in counterfactual reasoning may play a role in children's social evaluations. In the current study, we investigate how prompting children to engage in counterfactual thinking about positive moral actions impacts children's social evaluations. Eighty-seven 4-8-year-olds were introduced to a character who engaged in a positive moral action (shared a sticker with a friend) and asked about what else the character could have done with the sticker (counterfactual simulation). Children were asked to generate either a high number of counterfactuals (five alternative actions) or a low number of counterfactuals (one alternative action). Children were then asked a series of social evaluation questions contrasting that character with one who did not have a choice and had no alternatives (was told to give away the sticker to his friend). Results show that children who generated selfish counterfactuals were more likely to positively evaluate the character with choice than children who did not generate selfish counterfactuals, suggesting that generating counterfactuals most distant from the chosen action (prosociality) leads children to view prosocial actions more positively. We also found age-related changes: as children got older, regardless of the type of counterfactuals generated, they were more likely to evaluate the character with choice more positively. These results highlight the importance of counterfactual reasoning in the development of moral evaluations.

Research Highlights

• Older children were more likely to endorse agents who choose to share over those who do not have a choice.
• Children who were prompted to generate more counterfactuals were more likely to allocate resources to characters with choice.
• Children who generated selfish counterfactuals more positively evaluated agents with choice.
• Comparable to theories suggesting children punish willful transgressors more than accidental transgressors, we propose children also consider free will when making positive moral evaluations.

     

Implications of counterfactual structure for creative generation and analytical problem solving

In the present research, the authors hypothesized that additive counterfactual thinking mind-sets, activated by adding new antecedent elements to reconstruct reality, promote an expansive processing style that broadens conceptual attention and facilitates performance on creative generation tasks, whereas subtractive counter-factual thinking mind-sets, activated by removing antecedent elements to reconstruct reality, promote a relational processing style that enhances tendencies to consider relationships and associations and facilitates performance on analytical problem-solving tasks. A reanalysis of a published data set suggested that the counterfactual mind-set primes previously used in the literature tend to evoke subtractive counterfactuals. Studies 1 and 2 then demonstrated that subtractive counterfactual mind-sets enhanced performance on analytical problem-solving tasks relative to additive counterfactual mind-sets, whereas Studies 3 and 4 found that additive counterfactual mind-sets enhanced performance on creative generation tasks relative to subtractive counterfactual mind-sets.     

Counterfactual reasoning and the problem of selecting antecedent scenarios

A recent group of social scientists have argued that counterfactual questions play an essential role in their disciplines, and that it is possible to have rigorous methods to investigate them. Unfortunately, there has been little (if any) interaction between these social scientists and the philosophers who have long held that rigorous counterfactual reasoning is possible. In this paper, I hope to encourage some fresh thinking on both sides by creating new connections between them. I describe what I term “problem of selecting antecedent scenarios,” and show that this is an essential challenge in real-life counterfactual reasoning. Then, I demonstrate that the major extant theories of counterfactuals (especially the Lewis/Stalnaker theory and Igal Kvart’s rival account) are unable to solve this problem. I show that there are instances of real-life counterfactual reasoning in the social sciences that are counterexamples to both of these accounts. And finally, I develop a new theory of how to select antecedent scenarios that overcomes these difficulties, and so would be part of a more adequate theory of counterfactuals (and counterfactual reasoning).     

Mood, self-esteem, and simulated alternatives: thought-provoking affective influences on counterfactual direction

Four studies indicated that moods and self-esteem can influence counterfactual thoughts. This was shown for counterfactuals generated for hypothetical situations (Study 1), for recalled life events (Study 2), and for agreement with counterfactual statements after laboratory tasks (Studies 3 and 4). High self-esteem (HSE) and low self-esteem (LSE) persons generated (Studies 1 and 2) or agreed to (Studies 3 and 4) more downward (worse than actuality) than upward (better than actuality) counterfactuals when in good moods, but they diverged in reactions to bad moods: HSE persons thought more about downward counterfactuals, whereas LSE persons thought more about upward counterfactuals. HSE persons felt better after generating downward counterfactuals (Study 2) and took longer to agree to analogous statements (Studies 3 and 4) in bad moods, suggesting attempts at mood repair.     

Children’s causal reasoning: Counterfactual thinking occurs for ‘negative’ outcomes only

Harris, German and Mills (Children’s use of counterfactual thinking in causal reasoning. Cognition, 61 (1996), 223–259), following Mackie, argue that children make explicit use of counterfactual thinking in arriving at causal judgments. They showed that children as young as 3, in explaining simple mishap events, made reference to courses of action that a protagonist had rejected, when that course of action would have prevented the observed outcome. It is hypothesized here that such counterfactual thinking might have been invoked by the ‘negative’ mishaps rather than as part of the causal reasoning process. Although the generation of counterfactuals in explanation was replicated using mishap outcomes such as those used by Harris et al., counterfactual thinking was not evident in children’s explanations of ‘positive’ outcomes. These results undermine the view that a counterfactual thinking process, as indexed by reference to possible actions rejected by a protagonist, is necessary for causal reasoning. Alternative characterizations of the relationship between causals and counterfactuals are discussed.     

Is reasoning from counterfactual antecedents evidence for counterfactual reasoning?

In most developmental studies the only error children could make on counterfactual tasks was to answer with the current state of affairs. It was concluded that children who did not show this error are able to reason counterfactually. However, children might have avoided this error by using basic conditional reasoning (Rafetseder, Cristi-Vargas, & Perner, 2010). Basic conditional reasoning takes an antecedent, which like in counterfactual reasoning can be counter to fact, and combines it with a conditional (or set of conditionals reflecting knowledge of how the world works) to draw a likely conclusion. A critical feature of counterfactual reasoning then is that these additional assumptions be modelled after the actual events to which the counterfactual is taken to be counterfactual. In contrast in basic conditional reasoning one enriches the given antecedent with any plausible assumptions. In our tasks basic conditional reasoning leads to different answers than counterfactual reasoning. For instance, a doctor, sitting in the park with the intention to read a paper, is called to an emergency at the swimming pool. The question, "if there had been no emergency, where would the doctor be?" should counterfactually be answered "in the park". But ignoring the doctor's intentions and just reasoning on plausible grounds one might answer: "in the hospital". Only by 6 years, did children give mostly correct answers.     

Possible World Semantics and True‐True Counterfactuals

The standard semantics for counterfactuals ensures that any counterfactual with a true antecedent and true consequent is itself true. There have been many recent attempts to amend the standard semantics to avoid this result. I show that these proposals invalidate a number of further principles of the standard logic of counterfactuals. The case against the automatic truth of counterfactuals with true components does not extend to these further principles, however, so it is not clear that rejecting the latter should be a consequence of rejecting the former. Instead I consider how one might defuse putative counterexamples to the truth of true‐true counterfactuals.