The effect of different types of social norms on children's sharing behavior: The roles of parents, teachers, and peers

Abstract

As children develop, they are exposed to social norms that help them adapt to society. Here, the current study used an adapted dictator game to investigate whether exposure to a generous norm (sharing 80 yuan) or a selfish norm (sharing 20 yuan) would influence the sharing behavior of children. Participants were 1983 third‐ to fifth‐graders from five primary schools in mainland China (two in Beijing and three in Shandong). Norms were presented in the written format in which children were told the amount of personal resources that most of their parents/teachers/peers shared with a recipient (descriptive norms) or thought they should share with a recipient (injunctive norms). The results showed that children were more affected by generous norms than selfish norms. Moreover, when presented with generous norms, children were more sensitive to descriptive norms than to injunctive norms and they shared more when they were exposed to selfish descriptive norms than selfish injunctive norms. Additionally, children shared more and were more likely to comply with norms from teachers and peers in the generous condition, but they were less likely to comply with peers and deviated more from the undesirable norm from peers in the selfish condition. Together, our findings indicate the crucial importance of social norm information for the promotion of children's sharing behavior in China.

Psychometric Validation of the Adult Prosocialness Behavior Scale in a Professional Teaching Context

“…This agrees with the recommendations to evaluate the operationalization of the construct in a specific cultural, social, and professional framework [ 56 , 72 , 73 ], particularly one where prosociality becomes a relevant job skill [ 72 , 73 ] and—in the specific case of the context studied—authenticated by regulatory requirements [ 51 , 52 ]. Although possibly comparable in different degrees and forms of operationalization, the actions of helping [ 36 , 37 ], sharing [ 38 ], caring [ 39 , 40 , 41 ], and feeling empathy [ 32 , 43 , 44 , 45 , 46 , 47 , 48 ] constitute expressions of prosociality in various teaching scenarios, and it is displayed on multiple levels [ 1 ]. One is the micro-intrapersonal, which refers to dispositions and tendencies; another is the meso-intrapersonal, concerning behaviors directed to a person or small groups [ 1 ].…”

“…Another type of aid is the action of sharing. Generous teachers can serve as role models and encourage children to take actions aimed at sharing and giving to others [ 38 ]. In addition, among the contributors to academic and social success are the caring actions practiced at school in the context of teacher–student relationships [ 39 , 40 ].…”

Effects of morality and reputation on sharing behaviors in human-robot teams

“…According to the results of Experiment 2, moral constraints and reputation constraints, that is, considering moral rules and reputation, will affect sharing behaviors in humanrobot teams. Previous studies have shown that social norms affect human sharing behaviors (Wei et al, 2023), with morality and reputation being two important foundation. Sharing behaviors that conform to social norms is crucial for establishing and maintaining social relationships (Strauß and Bondü, 2023).…”

The role of between‐group competition in children's within‐group merit‐based resource allocation

“…The study also examined children's expectations for how a teacher, the primary conveyor of social norms and the most authoritative adult in children's daily lives (Benozio & Diesendruck, 2017; Wei et al., 2023), would allocate resources. As a common indicator in examining children's resource allocation (Elenbaas & Killen, 2016; Paulus et al., 2014; Rizzo et al., 2020), expectations can offer important insight into children's perceptions of the social norms surrounding resource allocations and show whether they are different from allocation behaviors.…”