Past research has demonstrated that children prefer to learn from confident rather than hesitant informants. It is frequently assumed that they do so because they believe confidence to predict a person's knowledge and future accuracy; however, this assumption has not previously been tested. The present investigation therefore explored how 3‐ to 8‐year‐old children interpret informant confidence. Study 1 (N = 84) aimed to address whether informant confidence is interpreted as an indicator of knowledge. Study 2 (N = 87) explored how children's interpretation changes with conflicting informant credibility cues. Findings demonstrate that school‐aged children, but not preschoolers, expect correct statements from confident individuals and incorrect statements from hesitant informants. Additionally, school‐age children attribute word knowledge to a previously confident informant. When accuracy conflicts with confidence, accuracy drives 3‐ to 8‐year‐old children's knowledge attributions. This investigation builds on previous research and suggests that, by age 5 or 6, children do make individual epistemic inferences based on informant confidence.

中文翻译：

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儿童认为自信的线人是准确的（除非证明不是这样）


过去的研究表明，孩子们更喜欢从自信而不是犹豫不决的线人那里学习。人们经常假设他们这样做是因为他们相信有信心预测一个人的知识和未来的准确性;但是，此假设以前尚未经过检验。因此，本调查探讨了 3 至 8 岁儿童如何解释线人的信心。研究 1 （N = 84） 旨在解决线人信心是否被解释为知识指标。研究 2 （N = 87） 探讨了儿童的解释如何随着相互冲突的线人可信度线索而变化。研究结果表明，学龄儿童（而不是学龄前儿童）期望自信的人做出正确的陈述，而犹豫不决的线人会做出错误的陈述。此外，学龄儿童将单词知识归因于以前自信的线人。当准确性与置信度冲突时，准确性会驱动 3 至 8 岁儿童的知识归因。这项调查建立在以前的研究基础上，表明到 5 岁或 6 岁时，儿童确实会根据线人的信心做出个人的认识推断。