title: The development of reasoning about the temporal and causal relations among past, present, and future events.
abstract: Children's capacity to reason about temporal and causal relations among past, present, and future events was investigated. In two studies, 4- and 6-year-olds (N=160) received structurally analogous search and planning tasks that required retrospective or prospective temporal-causal reasoning, respectively. The search task was compared with a closely matched control task that did not require temporal-causal reasoning. Results revealed that (a) both age groups solved the control task, (b) 6-year-olds mastered both retrospective and prospective tasks, and (c) 4-year-olds showed limited competence in both retrospective and prospective tasks. The current study, thus, suggests that flexible temporal-causal reasoning develops in parallel for past- and future-directed reasoning, is qualitatively different from simpler forms of temporal cognition, and develops during the late preschool years.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Psychology and Courant Research Centre "Evolution of Social Behaviour", University of Göttingen, D-37073 Göttingen, Germany. Electronic address: karoline.lohse@gmx.de.
authors.forename: Karoline
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Lohse
authors.affiliation: Institute of Psychology and Courant Research Centre "Evolution of Social Behaviour", University of Göttingen, D-37073 Göttingen, Germany.
authors.forename: Theresa
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Kalitschke
authors.affiliation: Institute of Psychology and Courant Research Centre "Evolution of Social Behaviour", University of Göttingen, D-37073 Göttingen, Germany.
authors.forename: Katja
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Ruthmann
authors.affiliation: Institute of Psychology and Courant Research Centre "Evolution of Social Behaviour", University of Göttingen, D-37073 Göttingen, Germany.
authors.forename: Hannes
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Rakoczy
mesh_terms: D002648:Child; D002657:Child Development / Q000502:physiology*; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D061212:Memory, Episodic; D013850:Thinking / Q000502:physiology*; D013995:Time
keywords: Causal reasoning; Episodic foresight; Episodic memory; Mental time travel; Planning; Temporal reasoning