The emergence and development of information avoidance

• In Event: Cooperation, Generosity, and Self-interest: New insights from economic games

Abstract

Across three studies, we examined the development of selective information avoidance in 5-10-year-old children. More than ever before, people have unprecedented access to free, useful, and easily accessible information spanning all aspects of life. Despite this access, people may nonetheless opt to remain ignorant (Golman et al, 2017) – a fact that is rendered especially puzzling given that information can be highly valuable and personally impactful. Much is known about the circumstances under which adults avoid information, but less is known about when and how information avoidance develops in the first place. Here, we present the first investigation of the emergence of information avoidance in young children.

Experiment 1
In Experiment 1 (N = 96; 5-10-year-olds), we examined 1) the developmental trajectory of children’s choice to avoid information, and 2) the relative weight children place on different underlying motivations to avoid information. Children were presented with scenarios intended to induce different motivations for avoiding information: Protecting Beliefs, Preferences, Biases, maintaining perceptions of Competence, Likeability, avoiding negative Emotions, and acting in Self-Interest. For each motivation, children were presented with one scenario in which the motivation to avoid information was present (i.e., Motivation-Present trials, where we would expect information avoidance), and an analogous scenario in which the motivation to avoid information was not present (i.e., Motivation-Absent trials, where we would not expect information avoidance. In the Motivation-Present trials designed to elicit information avoidance, whereas younger children readily sought out information, with age children were more likely to avoid information. Children’s information avoidance also depended on the motivation; children were most likely to avoid information for Beliefs, Emotions and Likeability, and Preferences. Interestingly, with age children were more likely to seek information pertaining to their Competence.

Experiments 2 & 3
In Experiment 2 (N = 120; 5-10-year-olds), we pre-registered, replicated, and extended our findings to also include a child-friendly version of a classic moral wiggle room task (Dana et al., 2007) to examine whether children selectively avoided information to facilitate self-interested behaviors. In this task, children decided between two payoffs (Payoff A and Payoff B), each resulting in a different distribution of stickers between themselves and their ostensible partner. We found that when we made the relationship between children’s choice (i.e., choice of Payoff A or Payoff B) and the subsequent outcome (i.e., partner’s payoff) ambiguous, the resulting moral “wiggle room” facilitated more self-interested information avoidance with age (Figure 4). In Experiment 3 (pre-registered; N = 120; 5-10-year-olds), we focused on the moral wiggle room task involving real payoffs to participants. Even though children had the option to costlessly reveal their partner’s payoff, older children avoided this information and opted for the self-interested payoff.

Together, these studies document the developmental origins of information avoidance. A developmental perspective is uniquely positioned to document the emergence of information avoidance, as well as how it changes across development. Importantly, rather than trying to intervene in maladaptive information avoidance in adulthood, a developmental lens would allow us to change the developmental trajectory of information avoidance as it develops in real-time.

Authors

• Radhika Santhanagopalan, University of Chicago
  Presenting Author

• Jane Risen, University of Chicago Booth School of Business

• Katherine D. Kinzler, University of Chicago