Social Pragmatics: Preschoolers Rely on Commonsense Psychology to Resolve Referential Underspecification
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Pragmatics_Final.pdf
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Author(s)
Jara‐Ettinger, Julian
Floyd, Sammy
Huey, Holly
Tenenbaum, Joshua B
Schulz, Laura E
Date Issued
July 2019
Journal
Child Development
Publisher
Wiley
Citation
Jara-Ettinger, Julian et al. "Social Pragmatics: Preschoolers Rely on Commonsense Psychology to Resolve Referential Underspecification." Child Development (July 2019): 1-15 © 2019 Society for Research in Child Development
Version
Author's final manuscript
Abstract
Four experiments show that 4‐ and 5‐year‐olds (total N = 112) can identify the referent of underdetermined utterances through their Naïve Utility Calculus—an intuitive theory of people’s behavior structured around an assumption that agents maximize utilities. In Experiments 1–2, a puppet asked for help without specifying to whom she was talking (“Can you help me?”). In Experiments 3–4, a puppet asked the child to pass an object without specifying what she wanted (“Can you pass me that one?”). Children’s responses suggest that they considered cost trade‐offs between the members in the interaction. These findings add to a body of work showing that reference resolution is informed by commonsense psychology from early in childhood.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences
Terms of Use
Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike
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DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1111/cdev.13290
