When fair procedures produce unequal outcomes, how do children feel?

• In Event: Poster Session 14
  In Poster Session: PS 14 Topic - Social Cognition

Abstract

Children as young as 3-4 years of age dislike receiving less than a peer and will even sacrifice rewards to prevent this (Blake & McAuliffe, 2011). However, when asked if the unequal distribution is okay or fair, most children say that this outcome is fair and only rate a disadvantage as unfair at 5 years of age (Lobue et al., 2011). By contrast, when 3 to 5 year olds receive an advantage, they accept the inequality, say that it is fair and are happy with the result. Recent suggests that fair procedures make receiving a disadvantage more acceptable (Shaw & Olson, 2014; Dunham et al., 2018), but it not clear whether this will affect children’s emotions, their own and others.

In the current study, we assessed children’s emotion ratings when they received less (1st person disadvantageous, DI) or more (1st person advantageous, AI) than a peer or when judging an allocation between two other children (3rd party, 3P). In all three between-subjects conditions, a fair coin (two colored sides) was used to distribute 1 and 6 stickers. Children between 4 and 9 years of age were recruited (mean age = 75 months; range = 49-116 months; 37 girls) in a museum (N=46) first and then online (N=19). The sample was predominantly White and mid to upper SES.

Children were introduced to the “game” which included the coin, the stickers and the recipients (photos for other children). After comprehension checks, the experimenter placed the fair coin into a shaker, shook it and revealed the results. Children were reminded that the coin was used to distribute the stickers and were asked to rate “how fair” the game was on a 4 point scale and how each recipient felt on a 5 point scale (1= Really sad to 5 = Really happy). Children were also asked why they gave the ratings they did.

We used GLMs with participant as random effect to account for repeated measures (ratings of the two recipients). Models tested the main effects and interactions of Age, Condition and Trial. Age was not significant, but there were main effects of Trial ( = 2.41, p < .001), Condition (DI) ( = 1.05, p < .01) and the interaction ( = -1.21, p < .05) (Figure 1). Children believed that those who received less would feel worse than those who received more. However, children in the 3P and AI conditions believed that the child who received less would feel worse than children actually felt in the DI condition (p < .01). Children who received less were also less likely to explain their emotion rating by reference to the outcomes (40%) compared to those rating a 3rd party child (70%) (Figure 2).

Although data collection is ongoing, results suggest that when a fair procedure is used,
children’s emotions remain driven by the outcome, but children expect to feel worse than they actually do when they receive a disadvantage. Fair procedures may thus encourage children to rationalize their disadvantage.

Authors

• Lucy Stowe, University of California - Davis
  Presenting Author

• Zoe Wilson, Boston University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Isabella Maehl, the University of Bath
  Non-Presenting Author

• Peter R. Blake, Boston University
  Non-Presenting Author