Causal learning from joint action: Collaboration helps first graders but hinders kindergartners

This study investigated whether early school-aged children's causal learning from collaborative joint action differs from their learning from their own individual action or observation. Children in a joint condition performed causal interventions with an adult on two causal systems. Children in an independent condition took turns and observed an adult perform the same interventions on one system and performed the same interventions themselves on the other system. Joint action improved first graders' (n = 60) causal inference compared with individual action and observation. However, joint action impaired kindergartners' (n = 60) inference relative to individual action and observation. These findings demonstrate that joint action, as a component of collaborative activity, can help or hinder inductive causal learning depending on features of the learner. Children's abilities to learn from collaborative joint action undergo a developmental shift during the early school years.