Reading Minds to Win: The Power of Cognitive and Affective Skills in Children's Strategic Play

Do children use private information to their own advantage? Is this ability related to emotional intelligence? To answer these questions, we conduct a large lab-in-the- eld experiment with 1662 participants from 8 to 18 years old who play a game with two-sided private information. We show that parti...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores: Alfonso Costillo, Antonio, Brañas Garza, Pablo Ernesto, Brocas, Isabelle, Carrillo, Juan D., Gonzalez, Juan B., Vázquez-De Francisco, María José
Tipo de recurso: artículo
Fecha de publicación:2025
País:España
Institución:Universidad Loyola Andalucía
Repositorio:Brújula
OAI Identifier:oai:repositorio.uloyola.es:20.500.12412/6585
Acceso en línea:https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12412/6585
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:Developmental decision-making
Private information
Rationality
Theory-ofmind
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spelling Reading Minds to Win: The Power of Cognitive and Affective Skills in Children's Strategic PlayAlfonso Costillo, AntonioBrañas Garza, Pablo ErnestoBrocas, IsabelleCarrillo, Juan D.Gonzalez, Juan B.Vázquez-De Francisco, María JoséDevelopmental decision-makingPrivate informationRationalityTheory-ofmindDo children use private information to their own advantage? Is this ability related to emotional intelligence? To answer these questions, we conduct a large lab-in-the- eld experiment with 1662 participants from 8 to 18 years old who play a game with two-sided private information. We show that participants of all ages understand the fundamental relationship between action and private information. The ability to select payo -enhancing strategies steadily increases with age but the capacity to recognize subtle variations in incentives triggered by changes in game structure remains elusive even for individuals at their peak cognitive capacity. Remarkably, participants of all ages who have heightened emotional intelligence exhibit a greater tendency to anticipate the behavior of others, best respond to them and, consequently, achieve higher payo s. The paper thus reveals a strong, robust connection between a ective and cognitive-theory-of-mind in young populations. It also highlights the importance of empathic skills for decision makingSe trata de un working paper aún sin publicar2025info:eu-repo/semantics/articlehttps://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12412/6585reponame:Brújulainstname:Universidad Loyola AndalucíaInglésWe thank the members of the Los Angeles Behavioral Economics Laboratory (LABEL) and the Loyola Behavioral Lab for their insights and to Chris Crabbe for his outstanding programming skills. Special thanks to Pablo Montero, M onica Vasco and Javier Gonz alez for excellent research assistance. We are grateful to the sta of Colegios Salesianos {in particular Andr es Corbacho, Manuel Redondo and M onica Sol s{ for their support in running the experiment in their schools. The study was conducted with the University of Southern California IRB approval UP-12-00528. We acknowledge the nancial support of the National Science Foundation grant SES-2315770, the Spanish Ministry project PID2021-126892NB-100, and the European Project Horizon GAP-10-1095175.http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccessoai:repositorio.uloyola.es:20.500.12412/65852026-06-24T12:48:37Z
dc.title.none.fl_str_mv Reading Minds to Win: The Power of Cognitive and Affective Skills in Children's Strategic Play
title Reading Minds to Win: The Power of Cognitive and Affective Skills in Children's Strategic Play
spellingShingle Reading Minds to Win: The Power of Cognitive and Affective Skills in Children's Strategic Play
Alfonso Costillo, Antonio
Developmental decision-making
Private information
Rationality
Theory-ofmind
title_short Reading Minds to Win: The Power of Cognitive and Affective Skills in Children's Strategic Play
title_full Reading Minds to Win: The Power of Cognitive and Affective Skills in Children's Strategic Play
title_fullStr Reading Minds to Win: The Power of Cognitive and Affective Skills in Children's Strategic Play
title_full_unstemmed Reading Minds to Win: The Power of Cognitive and Affective Skills in Children's Strategic Play
title_sort Reading Minds to Win: The Power of Cognitive and Affective Skills in Children's Strategic Play
dc.creator.none.fl_str_mv Alfonso Costillo, Antonio
Brañas Garza, Pablo Ernesto
Brocas, Isabelle
Carrillo, Juan D.
Gonzalez, Juan B.
Vázquez-De Francisco, María José
author Alfonso Costillo, Antonio
author_facet Alfonso Costillo, Antonio
Brañas Garza, Pablo Ernesto
Brocas, Isabelle
Carrillo, Juan D.
Gonzalez, Juan B.
Vázquez-De Francisco, María José
author_role author
author2 Brañas Garza, Pablo Ernesto
Brocas, Isabelle
Carrillo, Juan D.
Gonzalez, Juan B.
Vázquez-De Francisco, María José
author2_role author
author
author
author
author
dc.subject.none.fl_str_mv Developmental decision-making
Private information
Rationality
Theory-ofmind
topic Developmental decision-making
Private information
Rationality
Theory-ofmind
description Do children use private information to their own advantage? Is this ability related to emotional intelligence? To answer these questions, we conduct a large lab-in-the- eld experiment with 1662 participants from 8 to 18 years old who play a game with two-sided private information. We show that participants of all ages understand the fundamental relationship between action and private information. The ability to select payo -enhancing strategies steadily increases with age but the capacity to recognize subtle variations in incentives triggered by changes in game structure remains elusive even for individuals at their peak cognitive capacity. Remarkably, participants of all ages who have heightened emotional intelligence exhibit a greater tendency to anticipate the behavior of others, best respond to them and, consequently, achieve higher payo s. The paper thus reveals a strong, robust connection between a ective and cognitive-theory-of-mind in young populations. It also highlights the importance of empathic skills for decision making
publishDate 2025
dc.date.none.fl_str_mv 2025
dc.type.none.fl_str_mv info:eu-repo/semantics/article
format article
dc.identifier.none.fl_str_mv https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12412/6585
url https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12412/6585
dc.language.none.fl_str_mv Inglés
language_invalid_str_mv Inglés
dc.relation.none.fl_str_mv We thank the members of the Los Angeles Behavioral Economics Laboratory (LABEL) and the Loyola Behavioral Lab for their insights and to Chris Crabbe for his outstanding programming skills. Special thanks to Pablo Montero, M onica Vasco and Javier Gonz alez for excellent research assistance. We are grateful to the sta of Colegios Salesianos {in particular Andr es Corbacho, Manuel Redondo and M onica Sol s{ for their support in running the experiment in their schools. The study was conducted with the University of Southern California IRB approval UP-12-00528. We acknowledge the nancial support of the National Science Foundation grant SES-2315770, the Spanish Ministry project PID2021-126892NB-100, and the European Project Horizon GAP-10-1095175.
dc.rights.none.fl_str_mv http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess
rights_invalid_str_mv http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
eu_rights_str_mv openAccess
dc.source.none.fl_str_mv reponame:Brújula
instname:Universidad Loyola Andalucía
instname_str Universidad Loyola Andalucía
reponame_str Brújula
collection Brújula
repository.name.fl_str_mv
repository.mail.fl_str_mv
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