@article{779cee1b9fd640a6aa3ea9af557daea0,
title = "Ask me why, don't tell me why: Asking children for explanations facilitates relational thinking",
abstract = "Identifying abstract relations is essential for commonsense reasoning. Research suggests that even young children can infer relations such as “same” and “different,” but often fail to apply these concepts. Might the process of explaining facilitate the recognition and application of relational concepts? Based on prior work suggesting that explanation can be a powerful tool to promote abstract reasoning, we predicted that children would be more likely to discover and use an abstract relational rule when they were prompted to explain observations instantiating that rule, compared to when they received demonstration alone. Five- and 6-year-olds were given a modified Relational Match to Sample (RMTS) task, with repeated demonstrations of relational (same) matches by an adult. Half of the children were prompted to explain these matches; the other half reported the match they observed. Children who were prompted to explain showed immediate, stable success, while those only asked to report the outcome of the pedagogical demonstration did not. Findings provide evidence that explanation facilitates early abstraction over and above demonstration alone.",
keywords = "abstraction, cognitive development, explanation, relational reasoning",
author = "Erik Brockbank and Tania Lombrozo and Alison Gopnik and Walker, {Caren M.}",
note = "Funding Information: This research was supported by the Hellman Foundation, the Jacobs Foundation, and the National Science Foundation (SBE #2047581) to C. Walker. The authors would like to thank the parents and children who participated in this research. We are also grateful to the University of California, Berkeley Early Childhood Centers, the Lawrence Hall of Science, and the Center for Childhood Creativity at the Bay Area Discovery Museum for facilitating recruitment. We thank Dongwon (Vivien) Lee for assisting in data collection and Sophie Bridgers for her help in designing the experiment. Finally, we thank Aarthi Popat and Rose Reagan for additional data processing, validation, and help with participant demographics. Funding Information: This research was supported by the Hellman Foundation, the Jacobs Foundation, and the National Science Foundation (SBE #2047581) to C. Walker. The authors would like to thank the parents and children who participated in this research. We are also grateful to the University of California, Berkeley Early Childhood Centers, the Lawrence Hall of Science, and the Center for Childhood Creativity at the Bay Area Discovery Museum for facilitating recruitment. We thank Dongwon (Vivien) Lee for assisting in data collection and Sophie Bridgers for her help in designing the experiment. Finally, we thank Aarthi Popat and Rose Reagan for additional data processing, validation, and help with participant demographics. Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2022 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.",
year = "2023",
month = jan,
doi = "10.1111/desc.13274",
language = "English (US)",
volume = "26",
journal = "Developmental Science",
issn = "1363-755X",
publisher = "Wiley-Blackwell",
number = "1",
}