PREPRINT: Toddlers prefer those who win, but not when they win by force
Year: 2018
Type: preprint
Abstract: Social hierarchies occur across human societies, as well as in non- human animals. Thus, humans and other social species must navigate these relationships. Human infants can detect when one individual outranks another by using cues of formidability: they expect individuals who are smaller or who have fewer allies to defer in zero-sum conflicts. But do children prefer or avoid high-ranking individuals? Some non-human animals avoid high-ranking individuals, presumably to avoid provoking potentially costly conflict, while others, including bonobos prefer them. In human society, relation- ships with high-status individuals can provide benefits such as re- sources, know-how and protection. The present studies investigated whether children ages 21-31 months prefer or avoid high-status individuals. In Exp 1.0, children watched a right of way conflict between two puppets in which one puppet ’won’ because the other deferred. 18/21 toddlers reached for the puppet that won. Exp. 2.0 started with the same type of standoff, but one puppet knocked the other pup- pet down in order ’win’. In this case, 18/22 toddlers instead reached for the puppet that got knocked over and lost. Four additional experiments controlled for alternative explanations for the main findings. Thus, very young children prefer novel individuals who prevail in zero-sum conflicts but only when their opponents defer–not when they win through force. These results suggest that humans, from a very early age not only recognize relative status. They also incorporate it in their decisions about whether to approach or avoid others in a nuanced way that differs from our nearest primate relatives.
Source: OSF Preprints (OSF Preprints)
Language: English
Subfield: Developmental and Educational Psychology
Field: Psychology
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7160465783