A comparison of children and adults’ judgements and decisions based on verbal uncertainty statements

Gourdon, A., & Villejoubert, G. (2009). A comparison of children and adults' judgements and decisions based on verbal uncertainty statements. In N.A. Taatgen & H. van Rijn (Eds.), Proceedings of the 31st Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society. Austin, TX: Cognitive Science Society.

Children distinguish less well than adolescents the numerical meaning  conveyed  by  verbal  probabilities  (e.g.,  Mullet  & Rivet,  1991).  Little  is  known,  however,  about  children’s ability  to  grasp  the  directionality  of  verbal  probabilities (Teigen  &  Brun,  1995).  We  expected  children  to  only be influenced  by  directionality  and  congruence  of  statement framing with  their  goal. Thirty  children  and  29  adults made
probability  judgements  and  decisions  in  a  treasure  hunt context.  Results  revealed  that  children  are  sensitive  to the numerical meaning  of  verbal  probabilities  in  decisions,  and also  in  probability  judgements  related  to  goal!incongruent statement  framings.  The  different  demands  implied  by judging probabilities  and decision!making will be discussed, as well  as  the  independence  of  directionality  and  numerical value in adults’ interpretation of verbal probabilities.