Education

Our objective is to harness the empirical tools of cognitive science and related social scientific disciplines to improve educational outcomes.

We specialize in studying the sociocultural context of learning and development. Topics of study include cognitive and social development and academic achievement. We are particularly interested in teaching and learning in the context of family, teacher, and peer interaction.

We have active international research programs examining the impacts of education on individual and community outcomes. For example, we have studied cultural variation in teaching practices and social learning in twelve countries ranging from Ghana to Colombia to Malaysia. We are currently studying the impact of education on beliefs and behaviors surrounding topics of pressing global concerns, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, and resource conservation.

Education Projects

Featured

Accelerating Cultures of Collaboration to Empower Learning (ACCEL)

Accelerating Cultures of Collaboration to Empower Learning (ACCEL)

Designing a network of networks to address problems in global education.

Explaining, Exploring, and Scientific Reasoning in Museum Settings

Explaining, Exploring, and Scientific Reasoning in Museum Settings

Investigating how modifications to museum exhibit design and facilitation by museum staff influence family interaction and increase children’s causal learning

PLAY Project

Recording and revealing the behaviors of infants and mothers during natural activity in their homes, providing an unprecedented corpus of data

Thinkery Connect: A Museum-University-Community Research Partnership

Thinkery Connect: A Museum-University-Community Research Partnership

A museum-university-community research partnership

Culture of Schooling

Culture of Schooling

Studying the changes that take place when individuals, communities, and societies become exposed to formal education

The Development of Teaching and Social Learning Across Cultures

The Development of Teaching and Social Learning Across Cultures

Studying how culture influences the development of cognition over childhood

Related Articles

Articles

Designing museum exhibits to support the development of scientific thinking in informal learning environments: A university-museum-community partnership (PDF)

Legare, C.H., Ooi, Y.J., Elsayed, Y., & Barnett, A. Designing museum exhibits to support scientific thinking in informal learning environments: A university-museum-community partnership. In C. Yu & J. Lockman (Eds). Advances in Child Development and Behavior (66). Elsevier Press.

Foreign-language effects in cross-cultural behavioral research: Evidence from the Tanzanian Hadza (PDF)

Stibbard-Hawkes, D., Abarbanell, L., Mabulla, I.A., Endeko, E., Legare, C.H., & Apicella, C. (2024). Foreign-language eﬀects in cross-cultural behavioural research: Evidence from the Tanzanian Hadza, 3(6), 218. PNAS Nexus. https://doi.org/10.1093/pnasnexus/pgae218

Do the skies themselves send down showers? (PDF)

Erut, A., & Legare, C.H. (2024). Do the skies themselves send down showers? Current Anthropology, 65(2). https://doi.org/10.1086/729118

Related Press

Press

Three Ways Kids Can Learn Through Play at Home

- Life & Letters, College of Liberal Arts, UT Austin
May 7, 2020

If Your Kid Keeps Asking ‘Why,’ Give Them an Answer

- The New York Times
March 27, 2020

Exploration, Explanation, and Parent-Child Interaction in Museums

- Monograph Matters, Society for Research in Child Development
March 16, 2020

See all research areas