Not Noble Savages After All: Limits to Early Altruism

Abstract

Many scholars draw on evidence from evolutionary biology, behavioral economics, and infant research to argue that humans are "noble savages", endowed with indiscriminate kindness. We believe this is mistaken. While there is evidence for an early-emerging moral sense - even infants recognize and favor instances of fairness and kindness amongst third parties - altruistic behaviors are selective from the start. Babies and young children favor those who have been kind to them in the past, and favor familiar individuals over strangers. They hold strong biases for ingroup over outgroup and for self over other, and indeed are more unequivocally selfish than older children and adults. Much of what is most impressive about adult morality arises not through inborn capacities, but a fraught developmental process that involves exposure to culture and the exercise of rationality.

Human Expressions of Object Preference Affect Dogs’ Perceptual Focus, but Not Their Action Choices

“…Human infants display signs of altruistic sharing and fairness concern surprisingly early (as young as 15 months; Schmidt and Sommerville, 2011). Although the extent and limitations of early human altruism are still debated (Wynn et al, 2018), it seems stronger in human children than in young chimpanzees (Warneken and Tomasello, 2009). It is thus possible that some forms of responding to others' preferences are uniquely human.…”

How Could Children’s Storybooks Promote Empathy? A Conceptual Framework Based on Developmental Psychology and Literary Theory

“…Hess’ (2006) Selective Engagement Hypothesis posits that individuals selectively allocate their cognitive and affective resources to engagements with others if the engagements offer a return of investment either in the form of increased knowledge (information-seeking) or emotion (affection-seeking behavior). This chimes with Wynn et al (2017), who argue that children ‘naturally favor people whom they see as good individuals and who fall into their social groups’ (p. 2). The researchers describe babies and young children as ‘selective altruists’ and argue that the selective helping model in babies is propagated by three key developmental reasons: a child’s group belonging, past behavior and prior interactions with the other person (Wynn et al, 2017).…”

“…This chimes with Wynn et al (2017), who argue that children ‘naturally favor people whom they see as good individuals and who fall into their social groups’ (p. 2). The researchers describe babies and young children as ‘selective altruists’ and argue that the selective helping model in babies is propagated by three key developmental reasons: a child’s group belonging, past behavior and prior interactions with the other person (Wynn et al, 2017). A distinguishing contribution of the selective engagement hypothesis to the empathy discussion is that it introduces the importance of motivation in taking an action.…”

A model for cognitively-based compassion training: theoretical underpinnings and proposed mechanisms

“…family and friends). Research with infants and young children suggests that from a young age, helping behavior is often limited to those perceived as familiar or similar to oneself (Hamlin et al 2013;Wynn et al 2017). CBCT provides a model for cultivating compassion that extends beyond one's immediate circle and includes strangers and even adversaries.…”