Preschoolers' Scientific Curiosity and Inquiry Capabilities: An Ecological Research Approach

Abstract

Existing tools for measuring scientific curiosity often fail to capture its multifaceted, dynamic nature—particularly in early childhood, where behaviors are context-dependent, non-verbal, and emergent. These challenges limit our ability to understand and support young children's scientific engagement. Drawing upon two complementary theoretical frameworks, Loewenstein's information gap theory of curiosity and Gibson's affordance theory, this study sheds light on young children's scientific curiosity and inquiry capabilities by exploring their verbal (e.g., describing a phenomenon; asking questions) and non-verbal (e.g., moving closer, touching, smelling; exploring) behavioral responses in the course of their engagement in the Integrated Science Engagement Responsive Tasks (ISERT). The ISERT provides children with an authentic scientific environment that helps identify and assess the cognitive, emotional, and sensorimotor indications of children's scientific curiosity and inquiry capabilities. This study applied a mixed-method approach, analyzing quantitative and qualitative data gathered from 64 preschoolers (aged 4–6.5 years). The ISERT activities thrilled the children and provided an ecologically validated setting. The findings indicate that most participants exhibited rich repertoires of verbal and behavioral responses. The cognitive indications elicited from the children's ISERT responses were significant and varied. These results serve as additional evidence of the young participants' scientific curiosity and inquiry capabilities. However, the participants differed in their emotional and sensorimotor responses while executing the various scientific tasks. We propose the Exploration Qualities of Objects (EQO) concept. Gibson's theory explains how environments and objects invite action, while EQO shows how objects spark scientific inquiry to reduce information gaps. Items with higher EQO were selected more frequently, perceived as curiosity-arousing, and led to increased exploratory behaviors. An object's EQO can thus reflect the level of curiosity it generates. This paper discusses the theoretical, methodological, and pedagogical implications for fostering young children's scientific curiosity and enhancing their inquiry capabilities.