Yale University.
Princeton University.
Child Dev. 2020 Jul;91(4):1135-1149. doi: 10.1111/cdev.13290. Epub 2019 Jul 12.
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.
四项实验表明，4 至 5 岁儿童（总人数为 112 人）可以通过他们的朴素效用计算来确定未确定话语的指代对象——这是一种围绕着代理人最大化效用的假设构建的人们行为的直观理论。在实验 1-2 中，一个木偶没有具体说明她在和谁说话就寻求帮助（“你能帮我吗？”）。在实验 3-4 中，一个木偶让孩子传递一个物体，而没有具体说明她想要什么（“你能把那个递给我吗？”）。孩子们的反应表明，他们考虑了互动中成员之间的成本权衡。这些发现增加了一项表明参考解析是由儿童早期的常识心理学提供信息的工作。
