Children acquire extensive knowledge from others. Today, children receive information from not only people but also technological devices, like social robots. Two studies assessed whether young children appropriately trust technological informants. One hundred and four 3-year-olds learned the names of novel objects from either a pair of social…

A crucial human cognitive goal is to understand and to be understood. But understanding often takes active management. Two studies investigated early developmental processes of understanding management by focusing on young children's comprehension monitoring. We ask: When and how do young children actively monitor their comprehension of…

Reported are two studies which describe the early development in children of the ability to consider every one of an array of instances. Taken together with other recent studies, the data reveal early development in preschool children of a fundamental, general problem solving skill. (PCB)

Analysis of natural language data from children up to six years of age revealed that by the third year, children clearly distinguished between reality and a variety of nonreal contrasts in their everyday speech. An experimental study in which children were questioned about the reality and appearance of a variety of items confirmed findings of the…

Mental state language was examined in Mandarin- speaking and Cantonese-speaking toddlers. Results suggested that theory-of-mind development was similar to that in English, with early use of desire terms followed by other mental state references. Much earlier emergence of desire terms and infrequent use of thinking terms suggests cultural…