Poster #64 - Is Fairness Intuitive? The Effect of Time Pressure on Children’s Decision Making

• In Event: Poster Session 06

Abstract

Cooperation is central to human behavior, yet the cognitive mechanisms that support the development of cooperative decision making over time are still debated. The intuitive cooperation hypothesis proposes that, when forced to make a fast, intuitive decision, humans are more likely to behave cooperatively than selfishly, an idea that has received support from work with both adults and children (e.g., Rand et al., 2012, 2014; Plötner et al., 2021). However, most prior studies have only examined one type of cooperative behavior (generosity when sharing resources) and it remains unclear if this hypothesis will hold for other forms of cooperation such as fairness.

One recent study examined children’s fairness decisions and found that, in contrast to prior intuitive cooperation findings, younger children (ages 4-6) who made faster decisions were more likely to choose a selfish, rather than a fair, distribution, while reaction time was not associated with choice in older children (ages 7-9) (Chajes et al., 2022). One explanation for this inconsistency with prior findings is that Chajes et al.’s study did not manipulate children’s decision-making time and instead relied on their natural reaction times to infer the intuitiveness of their decisions. The current study will address this possibility by using a timing manipulation to promote intuitive or deliberate decision-making processes through a modified Dictator Game with 4-9-year-old children. The current study has been pre-registered on Open Science Framework, and data collection is currently in progress.

To examine the intuitive nature of children’s emerging fairness behavior during early childhood, an anticipated sample of 144 children will complete a forced-choice modified Dictator Game where they will choose between a fair or selfish distribution of resources for themselves and another (absent) child. Participants will be randomly assigned to either a time pressure condition where they will be told to make their decision quickly (<10 seconds), or a time delay condition where they will be told to wait and think carefully (≥10 seconds) before making their decision.

We hypothesize a main effect of age on choice, such that older children will be more likely to choose the fair distribution compared to younger children (as in Chajes et al., 2022). To test this, we will conduct a binary logistic regression to assess how age in years relates to children’s choice during the modified Dictator Game. Additionally, we hypothesize that there will be a main effect of condition on choice, such that children in the time pressure condition will be more likely to choose the fair distribution compared to children in the time delay condition. Here, we will use a chi-square test to assess whether children were more likely to choose the fair option in the time pressure condition compared to the time delay condition. We may also explore the possibility of an age x condition interaction effect on choice. This study will provide further insights into the underlying mechanisms that support fairness behavior during early childhood as well as the generalizability of the intuitive cooperation hypothesis to different cooperative behaviors and developmental timepoints.

Authors

• Hailey Raine Costello, University of Virginia - Charlottesville
  Presenting Author

• Johanna Rebecca Chajes, University of Virginia - Charlottesville

• Tobias Grossmann, University of Virginia - Charlottesville

• Amrisha Vaish, University of Virginia - Charlottesville