Do children always conform to a majority's testimony, or do the pragmatics of that testimony matter? We investigated the influence of pragmatics on conforming to a majority across 2 domains: when learning about object labels and when learning about causal relationships. Four- and 5-year-olds (N = 250) were given a choice between an object endorsed…

To date, hundreds of researchers have employed the method of Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) for the purpose of causal inference. In a recent series of simulation studies, however, several authors have questioned the correctness of QCA in this connection. Some prominent representatives of the method have replied in turn that simulations…

Researchers often seek to synthesize results of multiple studies on the same topic to draw statistical or substantive conclusions and to estimate effect sizes that will inform power analyses for future research. The most popular synthesis approach is meta-analysis. There have been few discussions and applications of other synthesis approaches.…

Retrieval practice of isolated words (e.g., with flashcards) enhances foreign vocabulary learning. However, vocabulary is often encountered in context. We investigated whether retrieval opportunities also enhance contextualized word learning. In two within-subjects experiments, participants encoded 24 foreign words and then read a story to further…

Data reasoning is an essential component of scientific reasoning, as a component of evidence evaluation. In this paper, we outline a model of scientific data reasoning that describes how data sensemaking underlies data reasoning. Data sensemaking, a relatively automatic process rooted in perceptual mechanisms that summarize large quantities of…

People on the autism spectrum may have difficulty inferring others' emotions (cognitive empathy), but may share another's emotions (affective empathy) and exhibit heightened personal distress. The present study examined independent autistic trait dimensions (social difficulties and restricted/repetitive behaviours) and the roles alexithymia and…

Peer-mediated instructional strategies (e.g., peer tutoring) have been effective at teaching academic responses in previous research. This study extended the literature by programming for inference-making, or derived relations. Across two experiments, researchers investigated the use of peer tutoring and inference-making to teach…

This paper comprises the results of a design study that aims at developing a theoretically and empirically based learning trajectory on statistical inference for 9th-grade students. Based on theories of informal statistical inference, an 8-step learning trajectory was designed. The trajectory consisted of two similar four step sequences: (1)…

The purpose of this qualitative study was to examine how teacher candidates' responses to a case provided an opportunity to make inferences about their dispositions and thus, build awareness of their assumptions. Fourteen teacher candidates responded to a dilemma-embedded case at the beginning and end of their student teaching semester. Candidate…

To better understand the developmental trajectory of children's pragmatic development, studies that examine more than one type of implicature as well as associated linguistic and cognitive factors are required. We investigated three- to five-year-old English-speaking children's (N = 71) performance in ad hoc quantity, scalar quantity and relevance…

The objective of this study was to measure the contribution of the left frontopolar cortex (FPC) to analogical reasoning. Our measure of analogical reasoning derives from performance on the radiation problem, a creative problem-solving task first used in Gestalt psychology (Duncker, 1945). Success on this task is as low as 10 % without the…

Testing item fit is central in item response theory (IRT) modeling, since a good fit is necessary to draw valid inferences from estimated model parameters. "Infit" and "outfit" fit statistics, widespread indices for detecting deviations from the Rasch model, are affected by data factors, such as sample size. Consequently, the…

When fitting unidimensional item response theory (IRT) models, the population distribution of the latent trait ([theta]) is often assumed to be normally distributed. However, some psychological theories would suggest a nonnormal [theta]. For example, some clinical traits (e.g., alcoholism, depression) are believed to follow a positively skewed…

This dissertation investigates whether social identity information modulates the interpretation of non-entailed clausal complement content (CC) in utterances of sentences such as (1): (1) Ken didn't hear that the minimum wage is too high. The focus of this dissertation is the listener 's inference that the speaker is committed to the truth of the…

A Monte Carlo simulation was performed to compare methods for handling missing data in growth mixture models. The methods considered in the current study were (a) a fully Bayesian approach using a Gibbs sampler, (b) full information maximum likelihood using the expectation-maximization algorithm, (c) multiple imputation, (d) a two-stage multiple…