{"pk":49318,"title":"Just unlucky?: Children are sensitive to the cause of rejection","subtitle":null,"abstract":"Rejection from clubs, teams, or schools is an inevitable part of growing up. Knowing when to quit or persist in the face of rejection is critical for goal pursuit, yet it is unclear how children respond to various sources of rejection. In a pre-registered experiment (N = 202), we tested whether 7- and 8-year-old children are sensitive to the cause of rejection. Children played a game in order to try out for a selective club and were rejected either based on merit (their performance) or by chance (a spinner). Children who experienced luck-based rejection felt better about their competence and persisted marginally more than those rejected based on merit. Across conditions, girls persisted more than boys, and persistence declined with age. These results suggest that by early elementary school, children are sensitive to the cause of their rejection, with implications for how they calibrate effort and pursue goals.","language":"eng","license":{"name":"","short_name":"","text":null,"url":""},"keywords":[{"word":"Psychology; Causal reasoning; Cognitive development; Learning; Social cognition"}],"section":"Papers with Oral Presentation","is_remote":true,"remote_url":"https://escholarship.org/uc/item/95g489p2","frozenauthors":[{"first_name":"Aarthi","middle_name":"","last_name":"Popat","name_suffix":"","institution":"Yale University","department":""},{"first_name":"Julia","middle_name":"Anne","last_name":"Leonard","name_suffix":"","institution":"Yale University","department":""}],"date_submitted":null,"date_accepted":null,"date_published":"2025-01-01T18:00:00Z","render_galley":null,"galleys":[{"label":"PDF","type":"pdf","path":"https://journalpub.escholarship.org/cognitivesciencesociety/article/49318/galley/37279/download/"}]}