@article {4812, title = {Learning from multiple informants: Children{\textquoteright}s response to epistemic bases for consensus judgments}, journal = {Journal of Experimental Child Psychology}, volume = {192}, year = {2020}, month = {04/2020}, pages = {104759}, keywords = {Consensus, Epistemic vigilance, Selective learning, social cognition, Testimony, Young children}, issn = {00220965}, doi = {10.1016/j.jecp.2019.104759}, url = {https://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0022096519303108}, author = {Kim, Sunae and Elizabeth S Spelke} } @article {4193, title = {Third-Party Preferences for Imitators in Preverbal Infants}, journal = {Open Mind}, volume = {2}, year = {2018}, month = {12/2018}, pages = {61 - 71}, abstract = {

Participants in social interactions often imitate one another, thereby enhancing their affiliation. Here we probe the nature and early development of imitation-based affiliation through studies of infants{\textquoteright} preferences for animated characters who imitate, or are imitated by, other characters. Four experiments provide evidence that preverbal infants preferentially attend to and approach individuals who imitate others. This preferential engagement is elicited by the elements of mimicry in simple acts of helping. It does not, however, extend to the targets of imitation in these interactions. This set of findings suggests infants{\textquoteright} imitation-based preferences are not well explained by homophily, prestige, or familiarity. We propose instead that infants perceive imitation as an indicator of valuable attributes in a potential social partner, including the capacity and motivation for social attention and coordinated action.

}, keywords = {imitation, infancy, social cognition}, doi = {10.1162/opmi_a_00018}, url = {https://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1162/opmi_a_00018}, author = {Lindsey J Powell and Elizabeth S Spelke} } @article {2534, title = {The cradle of social knowledge: Infants{\textquoteright} reasoning about caregiving and affiliation}, journal = {Cognition}, volume = {159}, year = {2017}, month = {02/2017}, pages = {102-116}, abstract = {

Considerable research has examined infants{\textquoteright} understanding and evaluations of social agents, but two questions remain unanswered: First, do infants organize observed social relations into larger structures, inferring the relationship between two social beings based on their relations to a third party? Second, how do infants reason about a type of social relation prominent in all societies: the caregiving relation between parents and their babies? In a series of experiments using animated events, we ask whether 15- to 18-month-old infants infer that two babies who were comforted by the same adult, or two adults who comforted the same baby, will affiliate with one another. We find that infants make both of these inferences, but they make no comparable inferences when presented with the same visible events with voices that specify a peer context, in which one adult responds to another laughing adult. Thus, infants are sensitive to at least one aspect of caregiving and organize relations between infants and adults into larger social structures.

}, keywords = {caregiving, social cognition, social development}, doi = {10.1016/j.cognition.2016.11.008}, author = {A C Spokes and Elizabeth S Spelke} } @article {2358, title = {Six-month-old infants expect agents to minimize the cost of their actions}, journal = {Cognition}, volume = {160}, year = {2017}, month = {03/2017}, pages = {35-42}, abstract = {

Substantial evidence indicates that infants expect agents to move directly to their goals when no obstacles block their paths, but the representations that articulate this expectation and its robustness have not been characterized. Across three experiments (total N = 60), 6-month-old infants responded to a novel, curvilinear action trajectory on the basis of its efficiency, in accord with the expectation that an agent will move to its goal on the least costly path that the environment affords. Infants expected minimally costly action when presented with a novel constraint, and extended this expectation to agents who had previously acted inefficiently. Infants{\textquoteright} understanding of goal-directed action cannot be explained alone by sen- sitivity to specific features of agent{\textquoteright}s actions (e.g. agents tend to move on straight paths, along supporting surfaces, when facing their goals directly) or extrapolations of agents{\textquoteright} past actions to their future ones (e.g. if an agent took the shortest path to an object in the past, it will continue to do so in the future). Instead, infants{\textquoteright} reasoning about efficiency accords with the overhypothesis that agents minimize the cost of their actions.

}, keywords = {cognitive development, goal inference, open data, open materials, social cognition}, issn = {00100277}, doi = {10.1016/j.cognition.2016.12.007}, url = {http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S001002771630302X}, author = {Shari Liu and Elizabeth S Spelke} } @article {1726, title = {Face Patch Resting State Networks Link Face Processing to Social Cognition.}, journal = {PLoS Biology}, volume = {13}, year = {2015}, month = {09/2015}, pages = {e1002245}, abstract = {

Faces transmit a wealth of social information. How this information is exchanged between face-processing centers and brain areas supporting social cognition remains largely unclear. Here we identify these routes using resting state functional magnetic resonance imaging in macaque monkeys. We find that face areas functionally connect to specific regions within frontal, temporal, and parietal cortices, as well as subcortical structures supporting emotive, mnemonic, and cognitive functions. This establishes the existence of an extended face-recognition system in the macaque. Furthermore, the face patch resting state networks and the default mode network in monkeys show a pattern of overlap akin to that between the social brain and the default mode network in humans: this overlap specifically includes the posterior superior temporal sulcus, medial parietal, and dorsomedial prefrontal cortex, areas supporting high-level social cognition in humans. Together, these results reveal the embedding of face areas into larger brain networks and suggest that the resting state networks of the face patch system offer a new, easily accessible venue into the functional organization of the social brain and into the evolution of possibly uniquely human social skills.

}, keywords = {Face recognition, neural nerworks, prefrontal cortex, social cognition}, issn = {1545-7885}, doi = {10.1371/journal.pbio.1002245}, url = {http://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.1002245}, author = {Schwiedrzik, Caspar M and Wilbert Zarco and Everling, Stefan and W. A. Freiwald} } @article {1206, title = {Not So Innocent: Toddlers{\textquoteright} Inferences About Costs and Culpability}, journal = {Psychological Science }, volume = {26}, year = {2015}, month = {05/2015}, pages = {633-40}, abstract = {

Adults{\textquoteright} social evaluations are influenced by their perception of other people{\textquoteright}s competence and motivation: Helping when it is difficult to help is praiseworthy, and not helping when it is easy to help is reprehensible. Here, we look at whether children{\textquoteright}s social evaluations are affected by the costs that agents incur. We found that toddlers can use the time and effort associated with goal-directed actions to distinguish agents, and that children prefer agents who incur fewer costs in completing a goal. When two agents refuse to help, children retain a preference for the more competent agent but infer that the less competent agent is nicer. These results suggest that children value agents who incur fewer costs, but understand that failure to engage in a low-cost action implies a lack of motivation. We propose that a naive utility calculus underlies inferences from the costs and rewards of goal-directed action and thereby supports social cognition.

}, keywords = {cognitive development, open data, open materials, social cognition, theory of mind}, doi = {10.1177/0956797615572806}, url = {http://pss.sagepub.com/content/early/2015/04/09/0956797615572806}, author = {Julian Jara-Ettinger}, editor = {Joshua B. Tenenbaum and Laura Schulz} }