Learning what to change: Young children use “difference-making” to identify causally relevant variables.

Novel causal systems pose a problem of variable choice: How can a reasoner decide which variable is causally relevant? Which variable in the system should a learner manipulate to try to produce a desired, yet unfamiliar, casual outcome? In much causal reasoning research, participants learn how a particular set of preselected variables produce a particular effect. Here, we investigate 3- to 5-year-olds' ability to select the relevant variable for...