"She must not know much about that": Children's inferences based on others' listener design

在课堂上，对表现不称职的担忧可能会对有效学习构成重大障碍。虽然我们知道学生们担心在犯错误时显得无能，但这个项目探讨了一种微妙而普遍的行为，这种行为也可能成为这样一种障碍：其他人如何对待孩子和与孩子交谈。两个孩子可以问完全相同的事情，但会根据其他人的看法（例如，教师向他们解释。如果老师用非常简单的方式来回答学生的问题，那么孩子们可能会认为学生知道的不多。这可能会使学生不愿意问问题摆在首位，因为害怕显得无知。更糟糕的是，陈规定型的群体可能会受到不成比例的影响。如果刻板印象表明一个群体缺乏能力或知识（例如，女孩不擅长数学），而一个演讲者持有这种信念，那么他们更有可能像缺乏知识一样与该组成员交谈（向女孩解释数学概念比男孩更简单）。通过这种方式，这些行为可能会无意中强化有害的刻板印象，并导致这些刻板印象群体的人在课堂上脱离。这些研究调查了儿童对这些线索的感知能力，并就如何防止这些问题扼杀儿童的学习提供了见解。这些研究利用实验室研究来探索儿童的评价和行为，解决了有关儿童新兴声誉思维的新问题。在发展过程中，孩子们能通过微妙的暗示来理解他人的心理状态吗？这些印象有多微妙？孩子们是否明白，别人对他们说话的方式可能并不反映这个人的实际知识，而只是说话者的假设？当有人确实低估了孩子们自己的知识时，他们如何试图纠正这种错误的校准，这是否使他们不愿意问问题？这些问题构成了本提案中一系列研究的基础，这些研究将促进对儿童心理表征的理解，这些心理表征是基于人们如何与之交谈而得出的声誉推断。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并被认为值得通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估来支持。

In the classroom, concerns with appearing incompetent can pose a significant barrier to learning effectively. While we know students worry about appearing incompetent when making mistakes, this project explores a subtle yet pervasive behavior that may also act as such a barrier: how others treat and talk to the child. Two children could ask the exact same thing, but be seen very differently based on how others (e.g., teachers) explain things to them. If a teacher explains something in a highly simple manner in response to a student’s question, then children may assume that student does not know much. This could make that student reluctant to ask questions in the first place for fear of appearing ignorant. Even worse, it is likely that stereotyped groups will be disproportionately impacted. If stereotypes indicate that a group lacks ability or knowledge (e.g., girls are not good at math) and a speaker holds this belief, then they are more likely to speak to members of that group as though they lack knowledge (explaining math concepts more simply to girls than boys). In this way, these behaviors may inadvertently reinforce harmful stereotypes and cause people from these stereotyped groups to disengage in the classroom. These studies investigate children’s ability to pick up on these cues and provide insights about how to prevent these concerns from stifling children’s learning. Using laboratory studies that probe children’s evaluations and behavior, these studies addresses new questions about children’s emerging reputational thinking. When in development can children understand others’ mental states by using subtle cues and how nuanced are these impressions? Do children understand that how someone is spoken to may not be reflective of that person’s actual knowledge, but only the speaker’s assumptions? When someone does underestimate children’s own knowledge, how do they attempt to correct this miscalibration and does it make them reluctant to ask questions? These questions underly the series of studies in this proposal, which will advance understanding of the mental representations that underlie children’s reputational inferences based on how people are spoken to.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.