Young Children Are Wishful Thinkers: The Development of Wishful Thinking in 3- to 10-Year-Old Children

• Wente, Adrienne O. ^[1] ; Goddu, Mariel K. ^[1] ; Garcia, Teresa ^[1] ; Posner, Elyanah ^[2] ; Fernández Flecha, María ^[2] ; Gopnik, Alison ^[1]
  1. [1] University of California System

     University of California System

     Estados Unidos

     
  2. [2] Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú

     Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú

     Perú

     
• Localización: Child development, ISSN 0009-3920, Vol. 91, Nº. 4, 2020, págs. 1166-1182
• Idioma: inglés
• Texto completo no disponible (Saber más ...)
• Resumen

  • Previously, research on wishful thinking has found that desires bias older children?s and adults? predictions during probabilistic reasoning tasks. In this article, we explore wishful thinking in children aged 3- to 10-years-old. Do young children learn to be wishful thinkers? Or do they begin with a wishful thinking bias that is gradually overturned during development? Across five experiments, we compare low- and middle-income United States and Peruvian 3- to 10-year-old children (N = 682). Children were asked to make predictions during games of chance. Across experiments, preschool-aged children from all backgrounds consistently displayed a strong wishful thinking bias. However, the bias declined with age.