Stella Christie

Where Hypotheses Come From: Learning New Relations by Structural Alignment

We test whether comparison can promote learning of new relational abstractions. In Experiment 1, preschoolers heard labels for novel spatial patterns and were asked to extend the label to one of two alternatives: one sharing an object with the standard or one having the same relational pattern as the standard. Children strongly preferred the object match when given one standard but were significantly more likely to choose the relational match when they compared two standards. Experiment 2 provided evidence that comparison processing—as opposed to simply seeing two exemplars—is necessary for this relational effect. Preschoolers who were shown the two standards sequentially without a prompt to compare them preferred object matches, as did those who viewed only one standard. In contrast, those who saw the exemplars together, with a prompt to compare them, showed the same elevated relational responding as found in Experiment 1. We suggest that structural alignment processes are crucial to developing new relational abstractions.

Mutual bootstrapping between language and analogical processing

Abstract What makes us so smart as a species, and what makes children such rapid learners? We argue that the answer to both questions lies in a mutual bootstrapping system comprised of (1) our exceptional capacity for relational cognition and (2) symbolic systems that augment this capacity. The ability to carry out structure-mapping processes of alignment and inference is inherent in human cognition. It is arguably the key inherent difference between humans and other great apes. But an equally important difference is that humans possess a symbolic language. The acquisition of language influences cognitive development in many ways. We focus here on the role of language in a mutually facilitating partnership with relational representation and reasoning. We suggest a positive feedback relation in which structural alignment processes support the acquisition of language, and in turn, language — especially relational language — supports structural alignment and reasoning. We review three kinds of evidence (a) evidence that analogical processes support childrens learning in a variety of domains; (b) more specifically, evidence that analogical processing fosters the acquisition of language, especially relational language; and (c) in the other direction, evidence that acquiring language fosters childrens ability to process analogies, focusing on spatial language and spatial analogies. We conclude with an analysis of the acquisition of cardinality — which we offer as a canonical case of how the combination of language and analogical processing fosters cognitive development.

Relational language supports relational cognition in humans and apes

We agree with Penn et al. that our human cognitive superiority derives from our exceptional relational ability. We far exceed other species in our ability to grasp analogies and to combine relations into higher-order structures (Gentner 2003). However, we argue here that possession of an elaborated symbol system – such as human language – is necessary to make our relational capacity operational.

Infants Make Quantity Discriminations for Substances

Infants can track small groups of solid objects, and infants can respond when these quantities change. But earlier work is equivocal about whether infants can track continuous substances, such as piles of sand. Experiment 1 (N = 88) used a habituation paradigm to show infants can register changes in the size of piles of sand that they see poured from a container when there is a 1-to-4 ratio. Experiment 2 (N = 82) tested whether infants could discriminate a 1-to-2 ratio. The results demonstrate that females could discriminate the difference but males could not. These findings constitute the youngest evidence of successful quantity discriminations for a noncohesive substance and begin to characterize the nature of the representation for noncohesive entities.

Structure Mapping For Social Learning

Analogical reasoning is a foundational tool for human learning, allowing learners to recognize relational structures in new events and domains. Here I sketch some grounds for understanding and applying analogical reasoning in social learning. The social world is fundamentally characterized by relations between people, with common relational structures-such as kinships and social hierarchies-forming social units that dictate social behaviors. Just as young learners use analogical reasoning for learning relational structures in other domains-spatial relations, verbs, relational categories-analogical reasoning ought to be a useful cognitive tool for acquiring social relations and structures.

The Cambridge Handbook of Psycholinguistics: Language and Cognition in Development

arenas, such as mathematics and time, than in more concrete domains such as color? Does language for emotions and for thought processes influence the way in which we construe our own minds? Does learning a technical language influence adult cognition in ways similar to the developmental patterns discussed here? Addressing these questions will give us a deeper understanding of how language affects the development of thought.