Trust me, I'm a competent expert: Developmental differences in children's use of an expert's explanation quality to infer trustworthiness.

In this study, we examined how 3-, 4-, 5-, and 7-year-old children respond when informants who are labeled as experts fail to provide high-quality explanations about phenomena within their realm of expertise. We found that 4-, 5-, and 7-year-olds discounted their initial trust in an expert who provided low-quality explanations in a task related to the expert's area of expertise. The 5-year-olds' distrust of the expert who provided low-quality explanations also generalized to additional learning tasks.

On the malleability of selective trust.

Although much research has explored the cues that young children use to determine informant credibility, little research has examined whether credibility judgments can change over time as a function of children's language environment. This study explored whether changes in the syntactic complexity of adults' testimony shifts 4- and 5-year-old children's (N = 42) credibility and learning judgments. Children from lower-socioeconomic status (SES) backgrounds were randomly assigned to hear a high proportion of complex language (the passive voice) or simpler language (the active voice) during 10 days of book-reading interactions with adult experimenters.

The uncontrollable nature of early learning experiences.

Early learning experiences shape the development of the behavioral constellation of deprivation (BCD) proposed by Pepper & Nettle (P&N). There is considerable variability in early learning experiences across diverse socioeconomic status (SES) backgrounds, particularly when it comes to language. Here, we discuss how early learning experiences are beyond the control of the individual and subsequently contribute to behaviors in P&N's constellation.

Question, Explanation, Follow-Up: A Mechanism for Learning From Others?

This study explored differences in caregiver-child interactions following children's information-seeking questions. Naturalistic speech from thirty-seven 4-year-olds and their caregivers was used to explore children's information-seeking questions, the caregiver's response, and children's subsequent follow-up. Half of the families were low-socioeconomic status (SES) and the other half were mid-SES.

Preschoolers' Preference for Syntactic Complexity Varies by Socioeconomic Status.

Two experiments investigated whether 4- and 5-year-old children choose to learn from informants who use more complex syntax (passive voice) over informants using more simple syntax (active voice). In Experiment 1 (N = 30), children viewed one informant who consistently used the passive voice and another who used active voice. When learning novel words from the two informants, children were more likely to endorse information from the passive informant.

The role of consensus and culture in children's imitation of inefficient actions.

A significant body of work has demonstrated children's imitative abilities when learning novel actions. Although some research has examined the role of cultural background in children's imitation of inefficient actions, to our knowledge no research has explored how culture and conformity interact when engaging in imitation. In Study 1, 87 Caucasian American and Chinese American preschoolers were presented with either one model or three models performing an inefficient action.

"Why does rain fall?": children prefer to learn from an informant who uses noncircular explanations.

These two studies explored 3- and 5-year-olds' evaluation of noncircular and circular explanations, and their use of such explanations to determine informant credibility. Although 5-year-olds demonstrated a selective preference for noncircular over circular explanations (Experiment 1: Long Explanations; Experiment 2: Short Explanations), 3-year-olds only demonstrated a preference for the noncircular when the explanations were shortened (Experiment 2). Children's evaluation of the explanations extended to their inferences about the informants' future credibility.