Preschoolers (sometimes) defer to the majority in making simple perceptual judgments

Three- and 4-year-old children were asked to judge which of a set of 3 lines was the longest, both independently and in the face of an inaccurate consensus among adult informants. Children were invariably accurate when making independent judgments but sometimes deferred to the inaccurate consensus. Nevertheless, the deference displayed by both age groups proved to be circumscribed. When asked to solve a practical problem--selecting the longest strip to build an adequate bridge--both groups relied on their own perceptual judgment, regardless of whether they had deferred to the inaccurate consensus. Confirming earlier meta-analytic findings with adults, the rate of deference was greater among Asian American children as compared with Caucasian American children.