Children and adults' intuitions of what people can believe

Two preregistered studies tested how 5- to 6-year-olds, 7- to 8-year-olds, and adults judged the possibility of holding alternative beliefs (N = 240, 110 females, U.S. sample, mixed ethnicities, data collected from September 2020 through October 2021). In Study 1, children and adults thought people could not hold different beliefs when their initial beliefs were supported by evidence (but judged they could without this evidential constraint). In Study 2, children and adults thought people could not hold different beliefs when their initial beliefs were moral beliefs (but judged they could without this moral constraint). Young children viewed moral beliefs as more constrained than adults. These results suggest that young children already have sophisticated intuitions of the possibility of holding various beliefs and how certain beliefs are constrained.     

Using centrality of concept maps as a measure of problem space states in computer-supported collaborative problem solving

Problem solving likely involves at least two broad stages, problem space representation and then problem solution (Newell and Simon, Human problem solving, 1972). The metric centrality that Freeman (Social Networks 1:215–239, 1978) implemented in social network analysis is offered here as a potential measure of both. This development research study applied centrality measures to reanalyze existing concept maps from a recent investigation (Engelmann and Hesse, Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning 5:299–319, 2010). Participants (N = 120) were randomly assigned to interdependent (i.e. hidden profiles) or non-interdependent conditions to work online in triads using CmapTools software to create a concept map in order to solve a problem scenario. The centrality values of these group-created concept maps agreed with the common relations count analysis used in that investigation and allowed for additional comparisons as well as analysis by multidimensional scaling. Specifically, the interdependent triad maps resembled the fully explicated problem space, while the non-interdependent triad maps mainly resembled the problem solution. The results demonstrate that centrality is a useful measure of knowledge structure contained in these team concept map artifacts that allows researchers to infer problem representation start and goal state transitions during problem solving.     

Evoking Knowledge and Information Awareness for Enhancing Computer-Supported Collaborative Problem Solving

Computer-supported collaboration by spatially distributed group members still involves interaction problems within the group. This article presents an empirical study investigating the question of whether computer-supported collaborative problem solving by spatially distributed group members can be fostered by evoking knowledge and information awareness, i.e., awareness of a group member with regard to both their fellow collaborators’ domain knowledge and information underlying this knowledge. The study (N = 30 triads) confirmed the efficiency of this approach by comparing (a) an experimental condition in which an environment for fostering knowledge and information awareness was provided and (b) a control condition without such an environment, with regard to communication and cooperation aspects, the quality of the group maps (needed for solving the problems), and the problem-solving performance.     

College students' willingness to terminate a pregnancy

403 male and 420 female Michigan State University undergraduate students responded to survey questions on their willingness to terminate a pregnancy. The number of students willing to terminate a pregnancy changed according to situational scenarios and general questions presented. While 96% opted to terminate a life-threatening tubal pregnancy, only 3% would do so in the case of a fetus of unwanted gender. Except for cases of incest and rape, respondents were 2.3 times more likely to terminate for biomedical than for psychosocial reasons. 89% were willing to terminate for incest and 82% for rape. The 75% who considered the fetus to be a child were less inclined to terminate than those who perceived otherwise. These findings paralleled those of other studies which found that attitudes toward abortion are not strongly linked to gender. Most respondents were able to weigh moral convictions against taxing situations when considering pregnancy termination.     

Moving Fiercely Linear Preservice Teachers into the Joys of Integrating Art in the Classroom: An Artist Residency in a University Early Childhood and Special Education Program

How can artist residencies for preservice teachers plant seeds for future classrooms? Teacher educators and a teaching artist describe a two-tiered residency in an early childhood and special education program that transformed preservice teachers' attitudes toward visual art and arts integration. Findings are based on teaching artist and instructor reflections as well as a qualitative analysis of student journal entries. Preservice teachers who had no prior art training and were resistant toward abstract painting began to enjoy it and appreciate the value of art for children's learning. They came to recognize visual art as a tool to support social development and children with special needs, understood the importance of process in children's art experiences, and considered ways to integrate art throughout the curriculum. We urge teacher educators and teaching artists to incorporate artist residencies into teacher education programs to prepare future teachers to integrate the arts into the classrooms of tomorrow.     

How children revise their beliefs in light of reasons

We investigate how the ability to respond appropriately to reasons provided in discourse develops in young children. In Study 1 (N = 58, Germany, 26 girls), 4- and 5-, but not 3-year-old children, differentiated good from bad reasons. In Study 2 (N = 131, Germany, 64 girls), 4- and 5-year-old children considered both the strength of evidence for their initial belief and the quality of socially provided reasons for an alternative view when deciding whether to change their minds. Study 3 (N = 80, the United States, 42 girls, preregistered) shows that 4- and 5-year-old children also consider meta-reasons (reasons about reasons) in their belief revision. These results suggest that by age 4, children possess key critical thinking capacities for participating in public discourse.     

Do chimpanzees reason logically?

Psychologists disagree about the development of logical concepts such as or and not. While some theorists argue that infants reason logically, others maintain that logical inference is contingent on linguistic abilities and emerges around age 4. In this Registered Report, we conducted five experiments on logical reasoning in chimpanzees. Subjects (N = 16; 10 females; M = 24 years) participated in the same setup that has been administered to children: the two-, three-, and four-cup-task. Chimpanzees performed above chance in the two-cup-, but not in the three-cup-task. Furthermore, chimpanzees selected the logically correct option more often in the test than the control condition of the four-cup-task. We discuss possible interpretations of these findings and conclude that our results are most consistent with non-deductive accounts.