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Category: Project

Description: Someone is rational in their thinking to the extent that they follow a rational procedure when determining what to believe. So whether someone is rational cannot be determined so much by whether they hold true or false beliefs (outcome-based rationality), but by how they arrived at these beliefs (procedure-based rationality). In this study, we want to answer the question to what extent 4-5-year-old children, 6-7-year-old children, and adults from China and the United States consider the procedure and the outcome in evaluating the rationality of an agent? In a picture book story, participants will be introduced to two characters whose pet ran away. They are trying to find the pet by using either rational (e.g. looking for the pet's traces) or irrational (e.g. using a spinning wheel) procedures that lead them to either the right (pointing at the location where the pet is hiding) or the wrong conclusion (pointing at the location where the pet is not hiding). More precisely, the participants will see three conditions: In an outcome matters condition, both characters are using an irrational procedure to find out where their pet is hiding, but one chooses the correct location, the other the wrong location. In a process matters condition, one of the characters is using a rational and the other is using an irrational procedure, while both choose wrong locations. In a process vs. outcome condition, one character is using an irrational procedure and point to the right location, the other character is using a rational procedure and point to the wrong location.