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Preschoolers are able to take merit into account when distributing goods
Title / Series / Name
Developmental Psychology
Publication Volume
48
Publication Issue
2
Pages
Editors
Keywords
URI
http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14018/11694
Abstract
Classic studies in developmental psychology demonstrate a relatively late development of equity, with children as old as 6 or even 8 to 10 years failing to follow the logic of merit—that is, giving more to those who contributed more. Following Piaget, these studies have been taken to indicate that judgements of justice develop slowly and follow a stage-like progression starting off with simple rules (e.g., equality: everyone receives the same) and only later on in development evolving into more complex ones (e.g., equity: distributions match contributions). Here, we report two experiments with 3- and 4-year-old children (N = 195) that contradict this constructivist account. Our results demonstrate that children as young as three years old are able to take merit into account by distributing tokens according to individual contributions but that this ability may be hidden by a preference for equality.
Topic
Publisher
Place of Publication
Type
Journal article
Date
2012
Language
ISBN
Identifiers
https://doi.org/10.1037/a0026598