This is us: Anna Thoma
Psychologist Anna Thoma from the Center for Adaptive Rationality studies how children learn different decision-making strategies. For her work, she has been awarded the Otto Hahn Medal 2024. In the interview, she provides insight into her work and explains why children tend to find more unlikely solutions to problems than adults. In our format "This is us," colleagues share insights into their work and motivation.
In the Center for Adaptive Rationality, you are working on how children learn to make ecologically rational decisions? What fascinates you about this topic?
Anna Thoma: We make many decisions early on in life: Which sibling is more likely to lend me a toy when I ask for it? Should I try a new flavor of ice cream or stick with the usual? In behavioral economics, the assumption that children make decisions like "naive" adults has persisted for a long time. However, this leads to a rather pessimistic view of the decision-making strategies and skills children can apply from a young age. Ecological rationality—the interplay between decision-making behavior and environmental factors—introduces exciting new perspectives: The interaction between ongoing brain development and increasing experience with the world fosters remarkable learning abilities in childhood. Children's decision-making behavior often supports new learning experiences, but sometimes makes it difficult to get the most out of them. I find it very exciting to explore the cognitive and environmental factors (especially "statistical" environmental factors) that shape the development of decision-making strategies and enable us to make ecologically rational decisions early in life.
What is meant by the "statistical" environment and what influence does it have on the development of a child's decision-making strategies?
Anna Thoma: The statistical environment describes the statistical context of a decision-making or learning situation, for example, how likely certain consequences or outcomes of a decision are and whether there are patterns in a sequence of outcomes. It is best explained with an example: : Imagine a parent offering a child carrots as a snack. However, the child is not in the mood for carrots and would rather eat something else. Over many such situations, the child can learn how likely it is to get a different snack and whether certain patterns influence this probability (e.g. only every third attempt is successful). To explore children's behavior in experiments, we use child-friendly games that enable experience-based learning of probabilities. For example, a guessing game about which of two houses an animal will hide behind next. Our research shows that children can use such probabilities to make decisions from the age of three, and younger children are particularly persistent in this regard (e.g., they repeatedly choose the same option). From school age onwards, children frequently switch between different options and can therefore more easily discover connections across decisions. And this is a point where children differ from adults. Adults explore less, which can make them more efficient in their decision-making process, but this does not come without drawbacks. For example, children can sometimes find an unlikely solution to a problem or an unlikely pattern more easily than adults because they search for information longer.
You were awarded the Otto Hahn Medal for your dissertation on this topic. How did you come to this research topic?
Anna Thoma: I found decision research fascinating during my studies, but I didn't yet know exactly what research topic I was interested in. At the time, I was already working as a research assistant with my future doctoral supervisor Christin Schulze. The question of how ecologically rational decision-making strategies emerge in childhood was developed in collaboration with Christin and she always supported me in the further development of the topics. Since my research lies at the intersection between cognitive psychology and developmental psychology, I have also benefited greatly from being involved as a doctoral student in the International Max Planck Research School on the Lifecourse (IMPRS LIFE) in addition to the expertise of my colleagues at ARC.
What interests you most about working with children?
Anna Thoma: Studies with children require a lot of planning but also creativity in study design. Whereas adults can carry out rather monotonous experiments without any problems, this would not work well with children. Experiments for children must be interesting, fun and should ideally not take too long. I really appreciate the direct and honest feedback from children in my experiments— that way you never stop learning yourself and get a better understanding of the thought process that children go through in the task.
What helps you to relax outside your research?
Anna Thoma: Fortunately, you never get bored in Berlin— from the countless restaurants that want to be discovered, to sailing on one of the many lakes, to longboarding on the Tempelhofer Feld. Preferably outside!
What do you value about the Max Planck community?
Anna Thoma: The expertise and interest of my colleagues in a wide variety of issues is a great motivation in my day-to-day research. There is never a lack of sparring partners to discuss an idea or test a new method. I consider it a great privilege to work in a place where a person's professional background is less important than their ability to familiarize themselves with a specific subject and bring a new perspective to the table.
