Psychology Department -> People -> Faculty Directory ->
Cristine Legare, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor of Psychology
Email: legare@psy.utexas.edu
Phone: 232-8044
Office: SEA 5.216
Cognition, Culture, and Development Lab
See also Developmental Psychology and Cognition
Research Interests
Cognitive development, conceptual development and causal reasoning, knowledge acquisition and learning, culture and cognition, cognitive science of religion
Dr. Legare received her Ph.D. in Developmental Psychology from the University of Michigan in 2008. She studies cognitive development with a focus on causal reasoning, conceptual development, and problem solving. Her approach to studying these topics is to integrate theory and research from cognitive developmental psychology and anthropology to examine these basic cognitive processes in particular content areas and cultural contexts. In her current research she is investigating mechanisms of causal knowledge acquisition by examining the development of children's questions and explanations. Her interests also include the co-existence of scientific and religious explanatory frameworks across development.
Representative Publications
For a full list of publications, including downloadable PDF file, see Dr. Legare's publications page.
Legare, C.H., & Souza, A. (in press). Evaluating ritual efficacy: Evidence from the supernatural. Cognition.
Legare, C.H., Evans, E.M., Rosengren, K., Harris, P. (in press). The coexistence of natural and supernatural explanations across cultures and development. Child Development.
Legare, C.H., Lane, J., & Evans, E.M. (in press). Anthropomorphizing science: How does it affect the development of evolutionary concepts? Merrill-Palmer Quarterly.
Legare, C.H. (2012). Exploring explanation: Explaining inconsistent information guides hypothesis-testing behavior in young children. Child Development, 83, 173-185.
Mills, C.M., & Legare, C.H., Grant, M. (2011). Determining whom to question, what to ask, and how much information to ask for: The development of inquiry in young children. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 110, 539-560.
Legare, C.H., & Visala, A. (2011). Between religion and science: Integrating psychological and philosophical accounts of explanatory coexistence. Human Development, 54, 169-184.
Souza, A., & Legare, C.H. (2011). The role of testimony in the evaluation of ritual expertise. Religion, Brain, and Behavior, 2, 1-8.
Lan, X., Legare, C.H., Ponitz, C., & Morrison, F. (2011). Investigating the links between the subcomponents of executive functioning and academic achievement: A cross-cultural analysis of Chinese and American preschool children. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 108, 677-692.
Mills, C.M., Legare, C.H., Bills, M., & Mejias, C. (2010). Preschoolers use questions as a tool to acquire knowledge from different sources. Journal of Cognition and Development, 11, 533-560.
