The Development of the Counterfactual Imagination

Abstract

When reasoning counterfactually, we think of alternative possibilities to what we know to be true about the world by imagining what would have happened had a situation been different. Research has yielded mixed findings and substantial debate over when this ability develops, how it is best conceptualized, and what functions it serves. In this article, we propose a framework of counterfactual reasoning in development. We argue that counterfactual reasoning is best understood by looking both at the representations of reality children manipulate counterfactually, and the cognitive processes that make up and contribute to counterfactual reasoning. In so doing, we highlight the fact that many of the component skills are present in early childhood. This framework yields testable predictions about children's counterfactual reasoning across a range of situations. We also discuss recent work that examines the contribution of counterfactual reasoning to learning in childhood.

Early Constraints on the Imagination: The Realism of Young Children

“…First, it invites further analysis of the extent to which reality‐based constraints continue to guide children’s imagination in the course of development. Consider, for example, the development of counterfactual thinking (Nyhout & Ganea, 2019). According to the present account, children should typically generate counterfactual alternatives that are closely tied to realistic possibilities even if they are receptive to more exotic possibilities when those are presented to them.…”

Thinking Counterfactually Supports Children’s Evidence Evaluation in Causal Learning

“…Prior research provides evidence that counterfactual reasoning—comparing a real event to some alternative, imagined outcome—can impact learning and inference in both children and adults (e.g., Frosch, McCormack, Lagnado, & Burns, 2012; Guajardo & Turley‐Ames, 2004; Harris, German, & Mills, 1996; McCormack, Simms, McGourty, & Beckers, 2013; Nyhout, Iannuzziello, Iannuzziello, Walker, & Ganea, 2019; Roese, 1994; Wells & Gavanski, 1989). This work falls under several broad theoretical accounts (see Nyhout & Ganea, 2019; Walker & Nyhout, 2020 for review).…”

The subject of children’s counterfactual thoughts.

“…Tasks vary in complexity, whether the content is mechanistic or a narrative, and whether mental time travel is involved. It is possible that we will find that multiple factors affect children's counterfactual thinking, a position taken by Nyhout & Ganea (2019b). Or it may be that some factors are more important than others, or even that we decide that under some circumstances children are not actually engaging in counterfactual thinking, but are using different strategies to reach what appear to be the correct answers to counterfactual questions.…”