CAREER: Understanding the Role of Explanation in Cognition

提出的研究发展和测试的解释帐户，以更好地了解其在认知中的作用。核心假设是，解释具有一定的属性，这些属性作为知识结构发展的机制，在支持概括、预测和干预的意义上是有用的。本研究提出的主要问题是解释如何有助于这种知识的形成。解释是根据几个解释的优点来评估的，这些优点增加了解释的感知质量。提出的研究考虑了两个线索：解释的简单性和其广度或统一不同现象的能力。两者都在科学和科学哲学中被引用，并在统计学和计算机科学的规范基础上得到证明。该研究描述了三种研究。实验室研究将有助于确定首选解释的特征，对通过在线环境寻求和产生的解释进行更自然的研究，以及对学习者提示生成解释或听事实的条件进行比较的实验。目标是理解解释的功能和内容。

The proposed research develops and tests an account of explanation to better understand its role in cognition. The central hypothesis is that explanations have certain properties that serve as a mechanism for the development of knowledge structures that are useful in the sense that they support generalization, prediction, and intervention. The primary question that this research asks is how explanation might contribute to the formation of such knowledge. Explanations are evaluated on the basis of several explanatory virtues - properties that increase the perceived quality of explanations. The proposed research considers two cues: an explanation's simplicity and its breadth or ability to unify diverse phenomena. Both are invoked in science and philosophy of science, and are justified on normative grounds within statistic and computer science. The study describes three kinds of studies. Lab studies that will help identify features of preferred explanations, a more naturalistic study of explanations that are sought and produced via an online environment, and an experiment to compare conditions in which learners are prompted to generate an explanation or listen to facts. The goal is to understand both the function and content of explanations.