Cognitive processes underlying the development of possibility judgements about improbable events: Studies with children and adults

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Unlike older children and adults, preschool children typically judge improbable events, such as making blue applesauce or finding an alligator under a bed, to be impossible. This developmental pattern is robust and holds for phenomena across the physical, psychological, and biological domains. Reasoning about possibility by drawing upon our prior knowledge and intuitions about how the world works is a core aspect of human cognition. It impacts our trust in what others tell us and how we invest our time and efforts. Thus, understanding the development of this capacity is important for both theoretical and practical reasons. The aim of this program of research is to (1) understand why children and adults make different judgements about the possibility of improbable events and (2) how this development occurs. Children and adults might be making different judgements about the possibility of improbable events because in adults such judgements involve a two-stage process whereas in children it is initially restricted to one stage of processing. Specifically, at the first stage, when asked whether an outcome is possible, children and adults consult their general knowledge and theories. For some phenomena, this stored knowledge supplies a definite answer. For other phenomena, however, no answer is available (at least initially). According to this model, young children (preschoolers) typically stop at this first stage and interpret the absence of an immediate answer as evidence against the possibility that an event could occur. In contrast, for older children and adults, the lack of an immediate answer leads to a second stage of processing that allows older children and adults to identify how those events could indeed occur. Three concurrent and complementary developments in children's cognition are hypothesized to support the deployment of this two-stage process as children age: developments in children's ability to selectively apply the fluency and availability heuristics in their judgements of possibility, developments in children's ability to use their imagination to simulate how the focal event could come to be and to search for events analogous to the one under consideration, and developments in their executive functions (these strategies are computationally intensive and this may make it harder for young children to deploy them). By better understanding how children determine what is possible and what is impossible, and why these judgements change over time, this research will help maintain Canada's cutting edge in the study of cognitive development. In addition, given that many scientific concepts seem impossible when we first encounter them, this line of research has the potential to help improve STEM education and thus contribute to Canada's global competitiveness. This program of research also offers excellent training opportunities for students interested in pursuing a wide variety of careers.