We develop a new design for the experimental beauty-contest game (BCG) that is suitable for children in school age and test it with 114 schoolchildren aged 9–11 years as well as with adults. In addition, we collect a measure for cognitive skills to link these abilities with successful performance in the game. Results demonstrate that children can successfully understand and play a BCG. Choices start at a slightly higher level than those of adults but learning over time and depth of reasoning are largely comparable with the results of studies run with adults. Cognitive skills, measured as fluid IQ, are predictive only of whether children choose weakly dominated strategies but are neither associated with lower choices in the first round nor with successful performance in the BCG. In the implementation of our new design of the BCG with adults we find results largely in line with behavior in the classical BCG. Our new design for the experimental BCG allows to study the development of strategic interaction skills starting already in school age.

我们开发了一种适用于学龄儿童的实验性美容比赛（BCG）的新设计，并针对114名9-11岁的学童以及成人进行了测试。此外，我们收集了一项认知技能的衡量标准，以将这些能力与游戏中的成功表现联系起来。结果表明，儿童可以成功地理解和玩BCG。选择的起点比成年人的选择略高，但是随着时间的推移和推理的深度，与成年人进行的研究结果大致相当。衡量为流动智商的认知技能只能预测儿童是否选择弱势主导的策略，但既不与第一轮的较低选择相关，也不与在BCG中的成功表现相关。在与成人一起实施我们的BCG新设计时，我们发现结果与经典BCG的行为基本一致。我们针对实验性BCG进行的新设计可让您从学龄开始就研究战略互动技能的发展。