Superstitious behaviors persist across time, culture, and age. Although often considered irrational and even potentially harmful, superstitions have recently been shown to have positive effects on stress levels, confidence, and ultimately, performance. However, it remains unclear how people conceive of superstitious behaviors, specifically,…

Young children tend to rely on reactive cognitive control (e.g. strongly slow down after an error), even when task accuracy would benefit from proactive cognitive control (taking a slower task approach up front). We investigated if giving young primary school children opportunities to repeatedly experience tasks where success rates depend on…

Remembering to carry out intended actions in the future, known as prospective memory (PM), is an important cognitive ability. In daily life, individuals remember to perform future tasks that might rely on effortful processes (monitoring) but also habitual tasks that might rely on more automatic processes. The development of PM across childhood in…