Young Children Use Direct and Indirect Evidence in Their Inferential Reasoning

ABSTRACT To reach rational conclusions, we often draw inferences about the evidence that supports one solution over another. This evidence can be direct and indicate why one option is correct, or indirect and indicate why the alternative option is incorrect. Understanding how young children interpret and use different types of evidence is central to their development of decision‐making and problem‐solving skills. In this preregistered online study, we investigated whether UK‐based preschool children could interpret different types of evidence to correctly infer the location of a toy. Two‐, 3‐ and 4‐year‐old children ( N = 73, 36 girls) correctly inferred the location of a toy (“it cannot be in box A, so it must be in box B”). Thus, 2‐year‐olds can reason by exclusion using indirect evidence to infer the correct solution, which might pave the way to later advanced perspective‐taking and argumentative skills.