Integrating Social reasoning and Logical reasoning in Infancy

Project Information

ISLI

Grant agreement ID: 101038068

DOI

10.3030/101038068

Project closed

EC signature date 7 April 2021

Start date 30 September 2021

End date 15 June 2024

Funded under

• SPREADING EXCELLENCE AND WIDENING PARTICIPATION

Total cost

€ 139 850,88

EU contribution

€ 139 850,88

Coordinated by

KOZEP-EUROPAI EGYETEM
Hungary

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - ISLI (Integrating Social reasoning and Logical reasoning in Infancy)

Reporting period: 2021-09-30 to 2023-09-29

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

Infants must learn many things about the world, long before they ever undergo any formal education. Previous research suggests that basic logical and social reasoning abilities emerge in the first year of life. This project asks whether these early abilities for reasoning about the logical world (for example: what is possible and what might be impossible) and the social world (for example: what others know and how it effects their actions) can provide infants with information about the physical world as well. We study whether infants are able to reason about logical possibilities or necessities to understand how an ongoing event will continue, whether infants understand the relationship between what someone thinks and how they will act, and how the language of a social partner guides the way that infants see events around them. Understanding what infants know of the logical, social and physical worlds, and especially how they can integrate what they know of these worlds, is crucial to understanding how learning unfolds during the first years of life.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

We developed a novel application of infant looking time methods to ask whether infants distinguish between possible, impossible and inevitable outcomes. Across a series of studies, we find evidence that infants understandings of physical events may be supported by logical building blocks. We also used linguistic methods to determine how infants understand certain words and sentences, and how this understanding guides their perception of the physical world. These results have presented at universities, conferences and workshops across Europe and in North America. They have also been communicated to individuals who directly participated in the research and members of the general public at science communication events in Budapest, Hungary and Vienna, Austria. The project has also resulted in 3 publications in journals and conference proceedings papers.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

This project has contributed to our understanding of how infants are able to use logical, social and linguistic sources of information to learn about the world. Infants may use core logical capacities to reason about what is possible or impossible to occur next. They may also use core linguistic capacities to understand what others are communicating to them, and use this information to understand the world around them and what could occur next. If these logical, social and linguistic sources of information are so important in learning about the world, it is crucial to understand how and when infants and young children begin to use and integrate them.

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