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Causal Learning Across Culture and Socioeconomic Status
Author(s) -
Wente Adrienne O.,
Kimura Katherine,
Walker Caren M.,
Banerjee Nirajana,
Fernández Flecha María,
MacDonald Bridget,
Lucas Christopher,
Gopnik Alison
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
child development
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.103
H-Index - 257
eISSN - 1467-8624
pISSN - 0009-3920
DOI - 10.1111/cdev.12943
Subject(s) - socioeconomic status , psychology , developmental psychology , middle class , child development , social class , cognitive development , causal model , demography , cognition , population , sociology , medicine , neuroscience , political science , law , pathology
Extensive research has explored the ability of young children to learn about the causal structure of the world from patterns of evidence. These studies, however, have been conducted with middle‐class samples from North America and Europe. In the present study, low‐income Peruvian 4‐ and 5‐year‐olds and adults, low‐income U.S. 4‐ and 5‐year‐olds in Head Start programs, and middle‐class children from the United States participated in a causal learning task ( N = 435). Consistent with previous studies, children learned both specific causal relations and more abstract causal principles across culture and socioeconomic status ( SES ). The Peruvian children and adults generally performed like middle‐class U.S. children and adults, but the low‐ SES U.S. children showed some differences.