The Role of Trait Inference and Pragmatic Inference in Young Children’s Selective Learning

This study investigates how preschoolers make trait inferences and pragmatic inferences about informants differing in informativeness, and how trait inference and pragmatic abilities affect their selective learning.

Four- and five-year-olds (N = 64) observed two informants who have differential access to a series of conjunctive causal events (full versus partial). They were then asked to make pragmatic and trait inferences about the informants before they selected one of the informants to learn from. Five-year-old children, but not 4-year-olds, selected the informative speaker to learn from.