Abstract

Only humans learn concepts like atom, integer, and democracy. But by all appearances, these abstract ideas are not present in the initial human state when babies are born. Other concepts like object, cause, or agent may be present early in infancy, if not innately. This volume explores the controversial science of human conceptual development, a traditional battleground for debates surrounding human nature. Are humans born good and tainted by an imperfect world? Or do we need to teach children to be moral? Could a concept like freedom be woven into the human soul, or is it a historical invention, constructed over generations of humans? What does it mean for a concept to be innate? Or for a concept to change? Are humans fundamentally different from other animals in how we think and reason about the world? The growing science of conceptual development seeks to explore these issues by targeting two specific questions: Which human concepts constitute innate, core, knowledge? and How do humans acquire new concepts, and how do these concepts change in development? This volume, written almost exclusively by developmental psychologists, documents key advances in case studies that address these questions, including ground-breaking science on language, moral reasoning, causal explanation, and human representations of objects, number, events, color, space, time, and other minds. art I Introduction 1 An Introduction to Core Knowledge and Conceptual Change David Barner and Andrew Scott Baron Part II Processes of Conceptual Change 2 Preliminary Thoughts on a Rational Constructivist Approach to Cognitive Development Fei Xu 3 How Is Conceptual Change Possible? Insights from Science Education Marianne Wiser and Carol L. Smith 4 Bundles of Contradiction Andrew Shtulman and Tania Lombrozo 5 Conceptual Change Deborah Zaitchik, Gregg E. A. Solomon, Nathan Tardiff, and Igor Bascandziev 6 Surprise Enhances Early Learning Lisa Feigenson Part IIIConcepts 7 Inferring Number, Time, and Color Concepts from Core Knowledge and Linguistic Structure Katie Wagner, Katharine Tillman, and David Barner 8 Different Faces of Language in Numerical Development Susan C. Levine and Renée Baillargeon 9 How Numbers Are Like the Earth Barbara W. Sarnecka 10 Epistemic Limitations and Precise Estimates in Analog Magnitude Representation Justin Halberda 11 A Framework for Work on Frames of Reference Anna Shusterman and Peggy Li Part IV Linguistic Structure 12 Mechanisms for Thinking about Kinds, Instances of Kinds, and Kinds of Kinds Sandeep Prasada 13 Concepts as Explanatory Structures Mahesh Srinivasan 14 Conceptualizing the Event Laura Lakusta and Laura Wagner 15 When Children Don’t Say What They Know Virginia Valian Part V Social and Moral Cognition 16 Core Knowledge and Conceptual Change Elizabeth S. Spelke 17 Is False Belief Understanding Continuous from Infancy to Preschool Age? Beate Sodian 18 What Neuroscience Can Reveal about Cognition and Its Origins Amy E. Skerry and Rebecca Saxe 19 What Develops in Moral Development? Paul Bloom and Karen Wynn 20 Developmental Origins of Social Group Preferences Andrew Scott Baron, Anthea Pun, and Yarrow Dunham.