{"pk":29902,"title":"Certain to be surprised:A preference for novel causal outcomes develops in early childhood","subtitle":null,"abstract":"A large literature on the development of causal reasoningcharacterizes early childhood as a period of curiosity,exploration, and experimentation. This suggests that a noveltypreference may be a universal hallmark of early causallearning. Functionally, such a bias might serve to directattention towards new opportunities for knowledge gain. Analternative possibility is that a preference for exploring noveloutcomes develops over time. In three experiments with 2- to5-year-olds, we investigate the developmental trajectory ofchildren’s preference for causal processes that producereliable versus novel outcomes. We find evidence for adevelopmental shift between ages 2 and 3: while two-year-olds trend toward a preference for reliable over noveloutcomes, older children clearly prefer novel ones. Wediscuss possible adaptive reasons for this developmental shift.","language":"eng","license":{"name":"","short_name":"","text":null,"url":""},"keywords":[{"word":"cognitive development; causal learning;exploration; novelty; determinism"}],"section":"Poster Session 2","is_remote":true,"remote_url":"https://escholarship.org/uc/item/1bx7d65x","frozenauthors":[{"first_name":"Mariel","middle_name":"K.","last_name":"Goddu","name_suffix":"","institution":"University of California, Berkeley","department":""},{"first_name":"Caren","middle_name":"M.","last_name":"Walker","name_suffix":"","institution":"University of California San Diego","department":""}],"date_submitted":null,"date_accepted":null,"date_published":"2020-01-01T18:00:00Z","render_galley":null,"galleys":[{"label":"PDF","type":"pdf","path":"https://journalpub.escholarship.org/cognitivesciencesociety/article/29902/galley/19756/download/"}]}