Pay to play: Children’s emerging ability to use acts of generosity for selfish ends

Warneken, Felix; Sebastián‐Enesco, Carla; Benjamin, Natalie E.; Pieloch, Kerrie

doi:10.1016/j.jecp.2019.104675

Cited by 19 publications

(31 citation statements)

References 42 publications

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“…Thus, we cannot directly compare these findings to other Ultimatum Game studies. However, our results are broadly in line with those of Warneken et al (2019), which consisted of a sharing task involving partner choice (rather than an Ultimatum Game) and found that 31.3% of 7‐year‐olds’ explanations mentioned strategy.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 92%

“…Prior research has yielded mixed evidence that young proposers are strategic in the Ultimatum Game, with some studies finding partial or non‐existent strategic thinking in children younger than 8 or 9 years of age (Bereby‐Meyer & Fiks, 2013; Leman et al, 2009; Murnighan & Saxon, 1998; Overgaauw et al, 2012). However, many children, as young as 6 years of age, behaved strategically in our study, echoing findings of young children's strategic approaches in other tasks (Herrmann et al, 2019; Sher et al, 2014; Warneken et al, 2019). Why might our methods have yielded strategic Ultimatum Game offers relatively early in development?…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 87%

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Children strategically conceal selfishness

et al. 2021

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Can children exploit knowledge asymmetries to get away with selfishness? This question was addressed by testing 6‐ to 9‐year‐old children (N = 164; 81 girls) from the Northeastern United States in a modified Ultimatum Game. Children were assigned to the roles of proposers (who offered some proportion of an endowment) and responders (who could accept or reject offers). Both players in the Informed condition knew the endowment quantity in each trial. However, in the Uninformed condition, only proposers knew this information. In this condition, many proposers made “strategically selfish” offers that seemed fair based on the responders’ incomplete knowledge but were actually highly selfish. These results indicate that even young children possess the ability to deceive others about their selfishness.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 92%

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 87%

Children strategically conceal selfishness

et al. 2021

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“…A second reason why the focal child's emotion following the deserving outcome in the current study may not have been as positive as predicted may be due to the age of children tested. Five-year-old children might increasingly engage in competitive social comparisons with peers (e.g., Warneken et al, 2019). The experimental manipulation of outcome context, in which one child was always helped at the expense of the other, may have caused a less other-oriented, and more self-focused emotion in the older age group of children in the current study.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 83%

How Being Observed Influences Preschoolers’ Emotions Following (Less) Deserving Help

Gerdemann¹,

Büchner²,

Hepach³

2022

Preprint

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Children sometimes show positive emotions in response to seeing others being helped, yet it remains poorly understood whether there is a strategic value to such emotional expressions. Here, we investigated the influence seeing a peer receive deserving help or not on children’s emotions, which were assessed while the peer was present or not. To measure children’s emotional expression, we used a motion depth sensor imaging camera, which recorded children’s body posture. Five-year-old children (N = 122) worked on a task which yielded greater rewards for them compared to their peer, rendering the peer to be in greater need of help. An adult––who was unaware of the different levels of neediness––then either helped the child who had a lesser need for help (less deserving outcome) or helped the needier peer (deserving outcome). Overall, both children showed a lowered body posture, a more negative emotional expression, after not being helped and an elevated body posture, a more positive emotional expression, after being helped. Seeing their peer (less deservedly) not receive help, and to a lesser extent being observed, blunted children’s otherwise positive emotions in response to receiving help. These results are discussed in the broader theoretical context of how children’s emotions sometimes reflect their commitment to cooperative relationships with peers.

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“…These patterns hint at the complexity of decoding the motives underpinning generosity: some helpful behaviour may well be motived by pure altruism, but it is clear that humans are also sensitive to the possibility of personal gains and adjust their investments in helpful behaviour accordingly (85), even from a young age (86).…”

Section: (I)mentioning

confidence: 99%

No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: the social costs of prosocial behaviour

Raihani¹

2021

Preprint

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Performing costly helpful behaviours can allow individuals to improve their reputation. Those who gain a good reputation are often preferred as interaction partners and are consequently better able to access support through cooperative relationships with others. But investing in prosocial displays can sometimes yield social costs: excessively generous individuals risk losing their good reputation, and even being vilified, ostracised or antisocially punished. As a consequence, people frequently try to downplay their prosocial actions or hide them from others. In this review, we explore when and why investments in prosocial behaviour are likely to yield social costs. We propose two key features of interactions that make it more likely that generous individuals will incur social costs when: (i) observers infer that helpful behaviour is motivated by strategic or selfish motives; and (ii) observers infer that helpful behaviour is detrimental to them. We describe how the cognition required to consider ulterior motives emerges over development and how these tendencies vary across cultures – and discuss how the potential for helpful actions to result in social costs might place boundaries on prosocial behaviour as well as limiting the contexts in which it might occur. We end by outlining the key avenues and priorities for future research.

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Pay to play: Children’s emerging ability to use acts of generosity for selfish ends

Cited by 19 publications

References 42 publications

Children strategically conceal selfishness

Children strategically conceal selfishness

How Being Observed Influences Preschoolers’ Emotions Following (Less) Deserving Help

No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: the social costs of prosocial behaviour

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