The origin and development of teleological intuitions about purpose

“Why are rocks pointy?”
“So that animals won’t sit on them and smash them.”

For most Western-educated adults, that kind of answer is unsatisfying as a way of explaining why a natural object like a rock has such a property. Even for the most geologically uninformed, a more appropriate response involves some kind of physical process, for example, “rocks are pointy because stuff builds up over time” or “rocks are pointy because bits got chipped away.” Our studies suggest, however, that the same is not true for young children: the properties of non-living natural objects exist for a purpose. That is, for first and many second graders, sand is grainy so that animals can easily lay their eggs in it, and ponds are waveless so that living things can bathe without getting washed away. By fourth grade, the tendency to prefer such explanations over physical ones is reduced but the finding of a developmental difference between younger children and adults is robust. It has been replicated cross-culturally and can be traced to earlier points in development.

Why do young children explain objects like rocks, lakes and their properties in terms of a purpose? Is it because their view of the natural world is fundamentally different from that of adults? Do children presume–as the famous psychologist Piaget argued that they do–that rocks and clouds are essentially no different from teapots and bicycles in that they are all products of human design or are young children more savvy than this? In fact, what do children’s explanatory preferences really reveal about their approach to categorizing and interpreting the world?

A number of our studies have explored this issue in different ways since questions such as these are at the core of psychological debates concerning the structure of early knowledge, the process of conceptual change and the influence of education and experience on conceptual organization.

Specifically, in a number of studies we have explored:

• Distinctions in children’s and adults’ reasoning about natural phenomena and artifacts
• How children and adults conceive of human-made artifacts (e.g., teapots, bicycles) and whether knowledge of artifact design informs other aspects of reasoning
• How children’s and adults’ explanatory tendencies shift as a function of culture and context and how explanatory conversations with parents might influence children’s beliefs
• How children’s and adults’ beliefs about purpose relate to their intuitions about intentional agency
• How background teleological beliefs about purpose influence memory recall

Functional Fixedness

Imagine someone hands you a box of matches, some thumb tacks and a candle and asks you to attach the candle to the wall using just these objects. What would you do? The solution involves taking a mental step back from the objects. Instead of seeing the matchbox as a container, you have to see it as a platform. After the box has been tacked to the wall, the candle can stand on it.

If you didn’t see the solution, don’t worry. Adults are routinely very bad at solving this kind of task (e.g., Dunker, 1965): Their tendency to view an artifact in terms of its original function impedes the capacity for creative problem solving–a classic phenomenon known as “functional fixedness.” But do children conceive of artifacts in the same way? How susceptible are they to functional fixedness?

Prior work with preschoolers finds that by around 4- to 5-years of age, children, like adults, view artifacts in terms of their original function. That is, they view an object that was made for one activity (e.g., stretching clothes) as “for” that activity even if it is consistently used for something else (e.g., exercising a bad back). However, there is evidence that younger children may be less committed to the idea of original design, accepting an object as “for” any activity someone wants it to be for. If that is the case, they may have less difficulty than adults creatively problem-solving with artifacts like boxes, cups, cans. In a series of studies, we have been exploring this possibility with the help of Teddy and his room.

In related projects, we have explored:

• The development of children’s tendency to view an object in terms of one function and its impact on adults’ and young children’s object play
  
• How knowledge of intended design and use influences children’s and adults’ naming and categorization of novel artifacts
• How children think artifacts originate and acquire functions

Reasoning about living things

Young children have a great deal to figure out when encountering unfamiliar animals. They have to decide what kinds of animals are likely to bite them, what kinds of animals are likely run away from them and what kinds of animals they are likely to encounter when they are swimming in the sea versus playing in the undergrowth. But even though different kinds of animals can look very similar (e.g., a billy goat and a common sheep), it may be misleading and potentially ill-advised for children to presume that because they look alike that they are going to act alike. Instead, one of the best ways of predicting particular aspects of an animal’s behavior is to pay attention to specific aspects of its’ appearance, in other words, its specialized functional adaptations. Thus, even though a booby bird and an otter don’t look very similar, they both possess webbed feet. On this basis it can be predicted that they act alike by being animals that spend a great deal of time in water. In contrast, an otter and weasel look alike but are actually quite different in their living habits. In one project we have explored when children become sensitive to functional adaptations as a basis for predicting animal behavior. Our results indicate that from at least 3 years of age, children preferentially attend to function information as a basis for drawing inferences about animals.

In other studies, we have explored:

• The influence of education and expertise on children’s and adults’ reasoning about biological function
  
• The influence of language on children’s attention to perceptual cues

Origins and Evolution

Existential angst may be one of the hallmarks of human experience. Questions concerning the origins of life have been a source of interest and inquiry since time immemorial. However, some answers to age-old questions have a better chance of becoming culturally distributed and transmitted than others. In particular, origins beliefs involving intentional causation, agency, and design reliably show up across widely disparate cultures. Furthermore, even the most committed of evolutionists often tend to treat or misconstrue natural selection as a process akin to intentional design.

Why does intention-based explanation gain primacy? To what extent is the human propensity for intentional explanation a function of our inherent cognitive “design”? One way to approach these kinds of questions is through cross-cultural work.

In related projects, we have also studied:

• How parents explain different objects and events to children
• The genetic basis to Theory of Mind
• Memory for agency information