Research article summary (published 29 Mar 2008):

Intuitive statistics by 8-month-old infants.

Full Abstract

Human learners make inductive inferences based on small amounts of data: we generalize from samples to populations and vice versa. The academic discipline of statistics formalizes these intuitive statistical inferences. What is the origin of this ability? We report six experiments investigating whether 8-month-old infants are "intuitive statisticians." Our results showed that, given a sample, the infants were able to make inferences about the population from which the sample had been drawn. Conversely, given information about the entire population of relatively small size, the infants were able to make predictions about the sample. Our findings provide evidence that infants possess a powerful mechanism for inductive learning, either using heuristics or basic principles of probability. This ability to make inferences based on samples or information about the population develops early and in the absence of schooling or explicit teaching. Human infants may be rational learners from very early in development.

Author information

Author/s: Xu, Fei (F); Garcia, Vashti (V);

Affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of British Columbia, 2136 West Mall, Vancouver, BC, Canada. fei(-atsign-)psych.ubc.ca

Journal and publication information

Publication Type: Journal Article; Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't; Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S.

Journal: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A), published in United States. (Language: eng)

Reference: 2008-Apr; vol 105 (issue 13) : pp 5012-5

Dates: Created 2008/04/02; Completed 2008/04/23; Revised 2008/11/20;

PMID: 18378901, status: MEDLINE (last retrieved date: 2/18/2009)

Sourced from the National Library of Medicine. Abstract text and other information may be subject to copyright.

External Links for this article
(including full text providers, if available):

Click Electronic Full-text Provider Links to see options for finding the electronic full text links to this article. Note there may be a subscription or fee required for access to the full text. See our FAQ for information on finding FREE full text articles.

This article may also be located in paper journal collections available in many libraries. Use the Journal and Publication Information above to find the full article.

MeSH headings (categories)

This article was linked to the MeSH Headings (categories) shown below.

Adult Female Humans Infant Intuition - physiology

Learning - physiology Logic Male Middle Aged Sample Size

Note: Bold headings indicate primary MeSH headings or qualifiers.

Related articles

These are the most related articles currently in our database:

• Characterizing the intuitive representation in problem solving: evidence from evaluating mathematical strategies. 29 Apr 1997
• Intuition: a social cognitive neuroscience approach. 30 Dec 1999
• Automatic and controlled components of judgment and decision making. 30 Oct 2006
• Decisions among time saving options: when intuition is strong and wrong. 21 Oct 2007
• Heart rate differences between targets and non targets in intuition tasks. 30 Oct 2005
• Ecological models of human performance based on affordance, emotion and intuition. 13 Jan 2003
• Co-operation with another player in a financially rewarded guessing game activates regions implicated in theory of mind. 30 Dec 2005
• Making order from chaos: the misguided frontal lobe. 29 Apr 2002
• Decision-making styles and physiological correlates of negative stress: is there a relation? 31 Mar 2008
• Theory-based Bayesian models of inductive learning and reasoning. 20 Jun 2006

See 100+ related articles.

Related Article Map

Legend: - FREE Full text Article. - Abstract only. - Title only. More help.

See a larger map of 100+ related articles.