Attributing motives to others: Children's and adults' explanations of interpersonal events

Abstract

Two experiments examined first, third, and fifth graders, (seventh graders in Experiment 2), and adults' ratings of an actor's mood, instrumental, social, and a variety of simple and complex psychological goals as explanations of an

Why do children and adults think other people punish?

“…For example, our findings suggest that children are willing to attribute a variety of different punitive motives to those who pursue punishment. This result aligns with other work indicating that children recognize that social behaviors may be driven not by a single motive but instead by a suite of different concerns (Pillow & Lovett, 2020). Additionally, the findings indicate that children are less prone than adults to modulate which motives they endorse as a function of social context.…”

“…More general social–cognitive factors may also help explain differences between children’s and adults’ punitive motives. For example, children (compared to adults) are inclined to attribute instrumental motives rather than social (goals that affect individuals’ relationships) or psychological ones (goals that influence individuals’ mental states) to those who engage in negative actions (Pillow & Lovett, 2020; Pillow et al, 2008). Although consequentialist and deontological explanations for punishment do not necessarily fit cleanly into the instrumental, social, and psychological categories, it is possible that children broadly view consequentialist explanations as more instrumental, transparent, and straight-forward and view deontological explanations (especially “just deserts”) as more psychological.…”

“…Beyond social learning, there are several social–cognitive reasons to suspect age-related differences in punitive motives. First, young children are more inclined to judge negative actions (e.g., refusing to share one’s toy blocks) as driven by instrumental motives (e.g., “Jack needs blocks to build a larger castle”) than social or psychological motives (e.g., “Jack does not want to be friend with Bobby,” “Jack wants Bobby to feel sad”; Pillow & Lovett, 2020). This finding suggests that children, relative to adults, may be more inclined to attribute instrumental motives to punishment (e.g., change the punisher’s future behavior) than social or psychological ones (e.g., restoring the social relationship, hurting the punisher’s feelings).…”