About

Dedre Gentner is a Professor of Learning Sciences at Northwestern University, with a background in psychology. She earned her PhD from the University of California, San Diego, in 1974. Her research focuses on learning, reasoning, and conceptual change in both adults and children, with particular emphasis on processes of similarity, metaphor, and analogy, as well as mental models and the acquisition of meaning. Her work explores how individuals develop understanding through these cognitive processes, contributing to the fields of psychology and education.

Research topics

• Artificial Intelligence
• Computer Science
• Natural Language Processing
• Information Retrieval
• Linguistics
• Cognitive psychology
• Cognitive science
• Computer vision
• Mathematics
• Psychology
• Philosophy

Selected publications

• The role of language in forming the concepts same and different

  Cognition · 2026-05-09

  articleSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• Structural Alignment and Linguistic Contrast Help Children Learn a Key Principle of Spatial Construction

  Cognitive Science · 2025-12-01

  articleOpen accessSenior authorCorresponding

  Spatial representation and reasoning are important in cognition, yet they are challenging for children. Research has shown that comparison can support learning about common spatial structure and that using common labels can facilitate this process. Here, we show that a comparable pattern holds for learning about differences. That is, contrastive labels can promote comparison-based learning of key spatial differences. In two experiments, 5- to 7-year-old children were asked to learn a key engineering principle-namely, that diagonal braces confer stability in building structures. Two factors were varied between subjects: the alignability of the training exemplars, and whether a contrastive label was used. Learning was assessed through a variety of transfer tasks, both immediately and after a delay of 2-5 days. The results showed that children in the high-alignment condition performed better than those in the low-alignment condition, replicating previous findings. Further, children who received the contrasting brace label performed better than those who did not. This suggests that hearing contrastive language can invite structural alignment and reveal differences that inform children's learning. We discuss broader implications for cognition and education.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• The Structure-Mapping Engine: A Multidecade Interaction Between Psychology and Artificial Intelligence

  Current Directions in Psychological Science · 2025-12-06

  article1st authorCorresponding

  This article describes the structure-mapping engine (SME) and its relation to psychological theory and research. SME was created in 1986 as a simulation of structure-mapping theory (SMT) and is still in use, both on its own and as part of larger scale simulations such as CogSketch and Companion that capture analogy’s roles in other cognitive processing. Over the 4 decades since artificial intelligence (AI) first appeared, there has been continual interaction between AI research and human research. We begin by briefly reviewing SMT and the basic construction of SME. After comparing SME with other simulations, we then describe some specific contributions of SME to our understanding of human analogical processing. We close by proposing that these psychological models can become a new technology for AI.

  PublisherDOI

• Analogy

  MIT Press eBooks · 2025-04-03 · 2 citations

  book-chapterOpen access1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Scaffolding to Support Analogical Comparisons with Science Images

  Underline Science Inc. · 2025-06-18

  otherOpen access

  This study examines scaffolding techniques to support students’ analogical comparisons with science images. Analogical comparison involves identifying deep relational structure over superficial similarities, which can be challenging without guidance. Across experiments, participants compared analogous evolutionary science images with or without various scaffolds: describing the relation, completing a mapping table, and spatial support for alignment. Results demonstrated that describing the relation and completing a mapping table, especially in combination, significantly enhanced scientific interpretations of the images. However, spatial support was ineffective. The findings highlight practical strategies for improving conceptual learning from science visuals.

  PublisherDOI

• Comparison Helps Children Form Broad Explanations

  Underline Science Inc. · 2025-06-18

  otherOpen access

  Research has shown that generating explanations can benefit learning in both children and adults. In part this is because people prefer explanations that characterize phenomena in terms of broad regularities. Here we propose that comparison is integral to the process of generating broad, satisfactory explanations. Specifically, (1) generating explanations often invokes comparison, (2) the resulting structural alignment process reveals commonalities that feed into a broad explanation. In Experiment 1a, we adapted a study on explanation-generation by Walker et al. (2017). 5- and 6-year-old children were asked to explain a set of outcomes that could result either from a single broad cause or from two or more specific causes. When children had the opportunity to compare the outcomes, they arrived at the broad explanation, replicating Walker et al. When comparison was made difficult, children preferred specific explanations. The results suggest that comparison is integral to the power of self-explanation. In Experiment 1b, we found that comparison by itself was not sufficient to lead children to broad explanations—suggesting that both explanation and comparison are critical in allowing children to attend to the broad pattern.

  PublisherDOI

• Scaffolding the Understanding of Scientific Analogies

  Underline Science Inc. · 2025-06-18

  otherOpen access

  Analogy is a mainstay in STEM education. It benefits learning by highlighting important commonalities between concepts and promoting transfer of knowledge. However, students often fail to process analogies deeply, and thus miss the potential benefits. This research aims to equip students with a domain-general strategy for understanding analogies. We created an Analogy Template that guides students through an explicit analysis of the relational matches and object correspondences. To test its effects, we gave undergraduates a series of science analogies. The Training group used the template to analyze the analogies. The Control group explained the same analogies without the template. Then both groups were asked to explain four novel science analogies. Raters blind to condition judged the explanations. Students who successfully completed the template training showed better understanding of the analogies than those in the control group. These results provide initial evidence that analogical training can contribute to science understanding.

  PublisherDOI

• Children’s Early Spontaneous Comparisons Predict Later Analogical Reasoning Skills: An Investigation of Parental Influence

  Open Mind · 2023-01-01 · 2 citations

  articleOpen access

  Laboratory studies have demonstrated beneficial effects of making comparisons on children's analogical reasoning skills. We extend this finding to an observational dataset comprising 42 children. The prevalence of specific comparisons, which identify a feature of similarity or difference, in children's spontaneous speech from 14-58 months is associated with higher scores in tests of verbal and non-verbal analogy in 6th grade. We test two pre-registered hypotheses about how parents influence children's production of specific comparisons: 1) via modelling, where parents produce specific comparisons during the sessions prior to child onset of this behaviour; 2) via responsiveness, where parents respond to their children's earliest specific comparisons in variably engaged ways. We do not find that parent modelling or responsiveness predicts children's production of specific comparisons. However, one of our pre-registered control analyses suggests that parents' global comparisons-comparisons that do not identify a specific feature of similarity or difference-may bootstrap children's later production of specific comparisons, controlling for parent IQ. We present exploratory analyses following up on this finding and suggest avenues for future confirmatory research. The results illuminate a potential route by which parents' behaviour may influence children's early spontaneous comparisons and potentially their later analogical reasoning skills.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• How Structure-Mapping Can Improve K-12 Education

  Discover Education · 2023-11-29

  preprintOpen accessSenior author

  Comparisons are commonplace in children’s learning and in K-12 education, but teachers are given limited guidance in how best to support students’ comparisons to lead to the strong learning outcomes. Structure mapping theory offers a well-articulated, evidence-based account of how people carry out comparisons and learn from them. The present article reviews this evidence and highlights ways best practices identified in the structure mapping literature can be used to improve student learning in the K-12 classroom.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Spatial alignment supports comparison of life science images.

  Journal of Experimental Psychology Applied · 2023-04-06

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  (Matlen et al., 2020). Here, we asked whether the spatial alignment principle extends to rich, educationally relevant stimuli, and how prior experience and spatial skill relate to spatial alignment effects. Participants were asked to find an incorrect bone within a skeleton, presented individually or paired with a correct skeleton in a layout that did (direct placement) or did not (impeded placement) support alignment (Kurtz & Gentner, 2013). Consistent with the spatial alignment principle, undergraduates (Study 1) showed an advantage of direct over impeded placement. Middle schoolers (Study 2) showed a direct advantage on items presented in atypical orientations. That atypical items showed the strongest effects suggests that direct placement may help most when materials are less familiar. However, neither individual differences in undergraduates' STEM course history, nor undergraduates' or middle schoolers' spatial skills moderated spatial alignment effects. Thus, applying the spatial alignment principle in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics has potential to improve visual comparisons, especially those that are challenging, for students of all spatial skill levels. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

  PublisherDOI

Recent grants

• Collaborative Research: Building Global Climate Change Literacy through Analogical Reasoning

  NSF · $93k · 2010–2013

• The Structure of Similarity

  NSF · $79k · 1988–1990

Frequent coauthors

• Kenneth D. Forbus

  51 shared

• Arthur B. Markman

  The University of Texas at Austin

  24 shared

• Susan Goldin‐Meadow

  18 shared

• Nina Simms

  Northwestern University

  16 shared

• Bryan J. Matlen

  American Society For Engineering Education

  14 shared

• Micah B. Goldwater

  University of Sydney

  14 shared

• Mary Jo Rattermann

  Resource (United States)

  14 shared

• Stella Christie

  Tsinghua University

  14 shared

Education

• Ph.D., Cognitive Psychology

  Stanford University

  1981

• M.A., Cognitive Psychology

  Stanford University

  1976

• B.A., Psychology

  University of California, Berkeley

  1973