Become a UCSD Kid Scientist!

The Early Learning & Cognition Lab has lots of fun, interactive studies that children can complete either in-person or entirely online. You can see the short descriptions of our current projects below. To participate, just click on the picture and schedule a time that works for you!

Our research would not be possible without you, so in thanks for your participation, your family will receive a $5 gift card after the session. Thank you for being a part of science with us!

IRB Approval: All of our studies have been approved by the IRB of the University of California, San Diego (Project #151866).

If you would like to participate in-person and visit our lab, please fill out this form!

Online Study Opportunities

If you would like to participate in a research game virtually, please check out these study opportunities listed below!

What can these machines make? (4- to 6-year-olds)

This 10-minute study will take place online via Zoom. In the game, your child will learn about the function of some toy boxes, and learn to predict how the toy boxes change shapes on a card.

What makes the machine go? : (5- to 7.5-year-olds)

In this game, your kid scientist will make different predictions about how a machine works! This game takes 10 minutes and is completed via zoom.

Let’s learn about scientific systems! : (6- to 11-year-olds)

In this game, we will explain different science concepts to your kid scientist, ask them questions about what they learned, and ask them to make comparisons to see what kinds of things they think are most similar! This game takes about 30-40 minutes over zoom!