Eva Rafetseder

Counterfactual Reasoning: Developing a Sense of “Nearest Possible World”

This study investigated at what point in development 3- to 6-year-old children begin to demonstrate counterfactual reasoning by controlling for fortuitously correct answers that result from basic conditional reasoning. Basic conditional reasoning occurs when one applies typical regularities (such as If whenever it doesnt rain the street is dry) to counterfactual questions (such as If it had not rained, would the street be wet or dry?) without regard to actual events (e.g., if street cleaners had just been washing the street). In counterfactual reasoning, however, the conditional reasoning must be constrained by actual events (according to the nearest possible world). In situations when counterfactual reasoning and basic conditional reasoning would yield the same answers, even the youngest children gave mostly correct answers. However, tasks in which the 2 reasoning strategies resulted in different answers proved unusually difficult even for the older children.

Counterfactual reasoning: From childhood to adulthood

Highlights ► Counterfactual reasoning (CFR) develops gradually between 6 and 12 years. ► This development is not solely due to better executive functioning. ► CFR means creating the nearest possible world of a specific event. ► Children who fail lack an understanding of what to import from the specific event. ► They rather apply conditionals that express general regularities.

When the alternative would have been better: Counterfactual reasoning and the emergence of regret

Counterfactual reasoning about how events could have turned out better is associated with the feeling of regret. However, developmental studies show a discrepancy between the onset of counterfactual reasoning (at 3 years) and the feeling of regret (at 6 years). In four experiments we explored possible reasons. Experiment 1 (3- to 6-year-old children) and Experiment 2 (adult control) show that even when regret is assessed more directly than in previous studies (e.g., Amsel & Smalley, 2000) only adults but not children regret their decision. Experiment 3 (3- to 14-year-old children) suggests that double-questioning—asking children how happy they are with what they got before and after they had seen what they could have got—creates false positive indications of regret in the youngest children and that—when controlling for false positives—regret is not evident before 9 years. However, children before this age make a difference between attractive (three candies) and less attractive (one candy) items (Experiment 4; 6- to 8-year-old children). Taken together, this suggests that before 9 years of age children base their judgements solely on what they got without taking into account what they could have got.

Is reasoning from counterfactual antecedents evidence for counterfactual reasoning

In most developmental studies the only error children could make on counterfactual tasks was to answer with the current state of affairs. It was concluded that children who did not show this error are able to reason counterfactually. However, children might have avoided this error by using basic conditional reasoning (Rafetseder, Cristi-Vargas, & Perner, 2010). Basic conditional reasoning takes background assumptions represented as conditionals about how the world works. If an antecedent of one of these conditionals is provided by the task, then a likely conclusion can be inferred based only on background assumptions. A critical feature of counterfactual reasoning is that the selection of these additional assumptions is constrained by actual events to which the counterfactual is taken to be counterfactual. In contrast, in basic conditional reasoning one enriches the given antecedent with any plausible assumptions, unconstrained by actual events. In our tasks basic conditional reasoning leads to different answers from counterfactual reasoning. For instance, a doctor, sitting in the park with the intention of reading a paper, is called to an emergency at the swimming pool. The question, “If there had been no emergency, where would the doctor be?” should counterfactually be answered “in the park”. But by ignoring the doctors intentions, and just reasoning from premises about the default location of a hospital doctor who has not been called out to an emergency, one might answer: “in the hospital”. Only by 6 years of age did children mostly give correct answers.

Counterfactual Reasoning: Sharpening Conceptual Distinctions in Developmental Studies

Counterfactual reasoning (CFR)—mentally representing what the world would be like now if things had been different in the past—is an important aspect of human cognition and the focus of research in areas such as philosophy, social psychology, and clinical psychology. More recently, it has also gained broad interest in cognitive developmental psychology, mainly focusing on the question of how this kind of reasoning can be characterized. Studies have been inconsistent in identifying when children can use CFR. In this article, we present theoretical positions that may account for this inconsistency and evaluate them in the light of research on counterfactual emotions.

Helping as an early indicator of a theory of mind: Mentalism or teleology?

This article challenges the claim that young children’s helping responses in Buttelmann, Carpenter, and Tomasello’s (2009) task are based on ascribing a false belief to a mistaken agent. In our first Study 18- to 32-month old children (N = 28) were more likely to help find a toy in the false belief than in the true belief condition. In Study 2, with 54 children of the same age, we assessed the authors’ mentalist interpretation of this result against an alternative teleological interpretation that does not make the assumption of belief ascription. The data speak in favor of our alternative. Children’s social competency is based more on inferences about what is likely to happen in a particular situation and on objective reasons for action than on inferences about agents’ mental states. We also discuss the need for testing serious alternative interpretations of claims about early belief understanding.

Basic Conditional Reasoning: How Children Mimic Counterfactual Reasoning

AbstractChildren approach counterfactual questions about stories with a reasoning strategy that falls short of adults’ Counterfactual Reasoning (CFR). It was dubbed “Basic Conditional Reasoning” (BCR) in Rafetseder et al. (Child Dev 81(1):376–389, 2010). In this paper we provide a characterisation of the differences between BCR and CFR using a distinction between permanent and nonpermanent features of stories and Lewis/Stalnaker counterfactual logic. The critical difference pertains to how consistency between a story and a conditional antecedent incompatible with a nonpermanent feature of the story is achieved. Basic conditional reasoners simply drop all nonpermanent features of the story. Counterfactual reasoners preserve as much of the story as possible while accommodatingnthe antecedent.

Belief and Counterfactuality: A teleological theory of belief attribution

The development and relation of counterfactual reasoning and false belief understanding were examined in 3- to 7-year-old children (N = 75) and adult controls (N = 14). The key question was whether false belief understanding engages counterfactual reasoning to infer what somebody else falsely believes. Findings revealed a strong correlation between false belief and counterfactual questions even in conditions in which children could commit errors other than the reality bias (rp = .51). The data suggest that mastery of belief attribution and counterfactual reasoning is not limited to one point in development but rather develops over a longer period. Moreover, the rare occurrence of reality errors calls into question whether young children’s errors in the classic false belief task are indeed the result of a failure to inhibit what they know to be actually the case. The data speak in favor of a teleological theory of belief attribution and challenges established theories of belief attribution.

Agenda for conceptualising and researching praise and criticism

We write to suggest a novel conceptualisation of praise which may inform future research. Praise is commonly used as a motivational tool (e.g. to encourage, socialise, ingratiate, seduce, reward and influence other people). How praise may motivate learning and academic performance, or influence a recipient’s self-esteem, both continue to attract scholarly attention. In contrast to some recent views (e.g. Brummelman et al.), we suggest that praise is a construct that probably resides on a bipolar continuum, ranging from one pole that is a strong positive message about performance (praise), through a zero-point, to an opposite pole that is a strong negative message about performance (criticism). This view suggests that interpersonal messages about performance consist of a praise–criticism continuum, while intrapersonal messages about performance consist of a self-affirmation–self-criticism continuum. This conceptualisation now requires empirical testing. Carol Dweck’s influential work has demonstrated that what is praised is important, because this can engender a ‘fixed mindset’ (the belief that basic qualities like talent or intelligence are fixed and cannot be changed), or a ‘growth mindset’ (the belief that basic qualities are malleable) in the recipient. However, researching praise and its consequences clearly extends beyond considering just what is praised because perceptions of praise (i.e. how praise is received) have been shown to be attenuated by a range of interacting variables. Consequently, two individuals working on the same task may interpret exactly the same praise message differently, depending on a wide range of factors. The most useful praise probably comes from people who know and understand us and whom we respect. These points suggest that when investigating the effects of praise on task performance or self-esteem, it is important that researchers examine the characteristics of praise and performance and how these are each perceived by the recipient. Relationships between praise, self-esteem and performance presumably differ depending on an individual’s effort during a task and whether they perceive that their performance actually represents their ability level (cf. Mueller and Dweck). Measuring perceptions of praise is necessary because it corroborates that intended and received messages are in fact the same (verifying experimental manipulations), and allows researchers to explore whether any effects are mediated by an individual’s interpretation of the praise they received. In our view, for praise (or criticism) to be useful and motivating to a recipient, it needs to be specific, realistic, plausible, context-appropriate, personalised and promote a growth mindset. Praise is likely to be less useful or motivating if it is generalised, unrealistic, implausible, de-contextualised, de-personalised or if it promotes a fixed mindset. Under one or more of the latter conditions, praise (or criticism) is vulnerable to being disregarded as irrelevant, experienced as invalidating, or to have an unintended demotivating effect.