Children consider informants' explanation quality with their social dominance in seeking novel explanations.

ABSTRACT: Identifying high-quality causal explanations is key to scientific understanding. This research (N = 202; 50% girls; M _age: 5.82 years; 64% Asian, 33% White, and 3% multiracial; data collected from 2018 to 2024) examined how explanation circularity and informants' social dominance impact children's learning preferences for causal explanations. Raised in a culture valuing circular logic, Chinese children still preferred non-circular explanations and learning from informants providing non-circular explanations (d ≥ 0.50). When informants with non-circular explanations were subordinate to those with circular explanations, Chinese and American children preferred non-circular over circular explanations (d = 1.10), but did not prefer learning new information from either informant. Alth

SUBMITTER: Ma S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11579642 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Nov-Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature