The role of ignorance in inferences about others' social identities: A developmental study

Children are sensitive to what others know and use this information to make social inferences about them. What others do not know, or ignorance, might also be a powerful cue about individuals' social attributes. In two studies, children's social identity attributions based on what others do and do not know were investigated. Whether children's own knowledge state has a role in this process and whether children differentiate between knowledge types when making social inferences, were also examined. Seven- and 8-year-old children (N = 100) were shown targets who were knowledgeable or ignorant of familiar and unfamiliar knowledge items and asked to guess targets' language. Items were about culture-specific (e.g., food or national flag) or general (e.g., shape of earth) knowledge. Both 7- and 8-year-olds used others' ignorance as well as their knowledge to make social identity judgments, however, knowledge yielded stronger inferences than ignorance. Children adjusted their inferences based on their own knowledge state (knowledgeable or ignorant) and also prioritized cultural knowledge as a marker in their social inferences. Social identity judgments of 8-year-olds were more sensitive to their own and others' knowledge states and type of knowledge compared to 7-year-olds' responses. These findings contribute to our understanding about children's sensitivity to others' epistemic states as well the social implications of such sensitivity.