Early developing expectations of intergroup empathy bias

• In Event: Minimal and real-world social categories shape expectations of prosocial behavior across development

Abstract

Prior research demonstrates that adults empathize with their ingroup: they feel good about ingroup fortunes, and bad about ingroup misfortunes (Cikara et al., 2011). Comparatively, adults experience less empathy, and even sometimes counter-empathy, for the outgroup. For example, adults exhibit Glückschmerz (feeling bad about someone’s fortune) and Schadenfreude (feeling good about another’s misfortune) for events that happen to the outgroup (see Cikara et al., 2014; Cikara & Fiske, 2013, for review). To our knowledge, only one study has investigated the ontogeny of intergroup empathy bias: anxious/distressed children report more empathy for their ingroup compared to an outgroup (Masten et al., 2010). Here, we extend these findings to investigate children’s and adults’ expectations about other people’s empathic biases. That is, do people expect others to experience more empathy for their group? And how do these expectations change across development?

In Study 1, we presented 4- to 10-year-olds (N = 114) and adults (N = 102) with a story about two novel groups: the Blues and the Yellows. In the story, a Blue and a Yellow both wanted the town’s last lollipop. One of the characters received it (fortune) and the other did not (misfortune). Then, participants predicted how other members of the groups who were not personally impacted felt about the fortune/misfortune (using a scale from Very Bad (0), to Very Good (5)). As example, if a Blue got the last lollipop instead of a Yellow, participants rated how both another Blue and another Yellow felt about the first Blue’s fortune and the first Yellow’s misfortune. Children and adults expected ingroup empathy: they said characters would feel good about an ingroup fortune, and bad about an ingroup misfortune. However, participants held diminished expectations of empathy for the outgroup: children and adults expected others to feel bad about outgroup fortunes (Glückschmerz; Fig. 1).

For Study 2, we investigated the malleability of expectations of intergroup empathy bias. Three- to 12-year-olds (N = 242) and adults (N = 160) were assigned to one of two conditions which varied in terms of whether the groups liked each other (Like condition) or disliked one another (Dislike condition). We predicted that expectations of intergroup empathy biases would increase when there was animosity between the two groups (Dislike condition) and potentially be ameliorated when the groups were fond of one another (Like condition). Although participants in both conditions continued to expect people to feel more empathy for the ingroup, the manipulation impacted expectations about outgroup empathy. That is, whereas participants in the Like condition expected outgroup empathy (they said that someone would feel good about an outgroup fortune and bad about an outgroup misfortune), in the Dislike condition, adults and children expected Glückschmerz and adults and older children (9 to 12 years) even expected Schadenfreude (Fig. 2).

We provide evidence that expectations of intergroup empathy bias emerge early in ontogeny, and that these expectations are especially pronounced when there is animosity between groups. Thus, even young humans incorporate group membership into their emotion-based expectations about the social world.

Authors

• Rodney Tompkins, University of California, Santa Barbara
  Presenting Author

• Katherine Vasquez, University of Chicago

• Emily Rachel Gonsier Gerdin, Yale University

• Yarrow C Dunham, Yale University

• Zoe Liberman, University of California - Santa Barbara