Lecture 8 Flashcards by Elizabeth Reczek

what are social norms

norms are a form of ‘social reality’
- the rule that people act in certain ways in certain contexts

e.g. One must or must not do X in Y context

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Domain Theory

2 general categories for social norms
- moral norms
- conventional norms

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Moral norms

concerning the welfare of others evolved from two natural tendencies:
- people have a natural tendency to help one another
- people avoid harm to one another

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Conventional norms

do not directly concern the welfare of others and have the following 3 properties:
- idiosyncratic
- agent-neutral
- context-specific

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examples of moral norms

one must help others
one should not steal
one should not hurt others

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examples of conventional norms

idiosyncratic: you can’t wear pjs to work (nothing wrong with it but you follow it)
agent-neutral: they are rules for all people and they should be respected (e.g. children should put yellow block in yellow bin not blue)
context-specific: rule may only be valid in a specific context (e.g. in a specific nursery you would follow these rules, maybe not at home)

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classical view of moral development

young children are
- egocentric
- selfish
- amoral

children are only following rules to avoid punishment or get rewards

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Domain theory: In Piagetian tradition

Piaget interviewed children with hypothetical scenarios in which people commit norm violations: moral (hitting someone) vs conventional (eating while standing)
by age 4 children are able to distinguish different ‘domains’ of social norms
moral norms: unchangeable, serious, punishable, context-independent, authority-independent
conventional norms:
changeable, less serious, less punishable context-dependent, authority-dependent

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the standard view (Piaget/Kohlberg)

children begin was amoral agents, eventually bound by rules
only gradually begin to reason morally

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evidence against Piaget

young children show important precursors to morality: early prosociality
young children show sophisticated understanding of social norms

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two-step model (Tomasello & Vanish 2012)

twos teps in the ontogeny (development) of human morality
step 1: second-person morality
step 2: preschoolers’ norm-based morality

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step 1 in the two-step model

SECOND-PERSON morality
before age 3
(PREFERENCE to individuals e.g. friends)

helping, sympathy
collaboration, sharing

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step 2 in the two-step model

preschoolers’ NORM-BASED morality
age 3+
AGENT NEUTRAL (anyone they know)

enforcement of social norms (should/must help each other)
(guilt and shame)

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Step one: second-person morality

infancy: 0-12 mo
- empathy
- social preferences

ages 1-3: more ‘active’ prosociality
- helping, sympathy
- sharing

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empathy: step one: evidence

infancy 0-12 mo
- Dondi et al 1999
- new born distress was significantly greater for hearing other babies cries than for their own recorded crying

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social preferences: step one: evidence

‘good’ over ‘bad’
Hamlin et al. 2007
6-10 mo old infants prefer ‘good guys’ (helpers) over ‘bad guys’ (hinderers)
neutral objects over hinderers

(shown video of object trying to push something up a hill, children touched object they preferred first)

shows innate morality to help distinguish helpful and unhelpful people

limitations for social preferences study

indirect measures are used with younger children: touching one object over another:preferential looking
not strong evidence that children actually understand moral differences, but best for the age group

methodological differences

younger children we can only use indirect measures

but children older than 1 we can look at active behaviour paradigms

active prosociality study - step one -evidence for age 1-2

Tomasello et al. 2006
children actively participate in helping adults at 1 & 2: want to help others achieve goals
they read intentions/goals of individuals and determine whether they need help or not
(control: when adults are in the same situation but make it clear they don’t want to open the cabinet, children do not help)

intrinsic motivation

one does things because it feels nice and right

extrinsic motivation

one does things because of external reward (or to avoid punishment)

childrens’ motivation for helping; intrinsic or extrinsic

Tomasello 2012 evidence
pupil dilation: indicating stress
3 conditions: child helps adult, no one helps adult, someone else helps adult
when children could help the adult, distress reduced (reduced dilation)
same response for someone else helping the adult
in no help distress remained (pupils dilated)
regardless of by whom, children’s distress reduced when adult received help: intrinsic ?

selective helping

Tomasello 2010
young children (3 yr olds) selectively avoid helping people with harmful intentions

-pay attention to intentions but not necessarily the harm

selective helping and what it shows

helping comes naturally to children; its an early emergence
intrinsically motivated to help others (rewards don’t change this)
cross-culturally observed
could be rooted in sympathetic emotions (babies in distress)
this is cognitively flexible; selectively help individuals e.g. if adult doesn’t need help they won’t help

'natural' help

- as opposed to culturally - doesn't mean that social interaction has no impact, but not taught intentionally - once kids are helping, socialization can then 'shape' it

collaboration

towards step 2 - children might work with a peer and earn something together: will children notice if one child gets more reward and notice the unfairness ?

collaborating and sharing: towards step 2

Hamann et al. 2011 - 2-3 yr olds - unequal distribution of resources (1 vs. 3 marbles) - children when working collaboratively -> children shared marbles equally - children with parallel work (independent work)-> children did not share marbles - see partner as equal - sense for fairness emerging

summary of of step-1

- early prosocial morality is based on second-personal interactions and relationships 0-3 yrs - helping and concern about others individuals emerges early and comes naturally - children are motivated to collaborate and consider partners as equal (if equal effort) - natural morality becomes increasingly flexible - morality begins in dyadic interactions without group norms: second-personal (dealing with other people)

step two: norm-based morality fundamentals

agent neutral enforcement of social norms guilt and shame

limitations of moral judgment studies

- interview method relies on verbal ability, reasoning and thinking: cannot observe young children as reliably as they may not understand - is making moral judgment enough: they might know but may not act on it

moral judgment in action evidence - Rakoczy et al. 2008 - step 2

- experimental study - 2-3 yr olds taught a novel game called 'daxing': children witness puppets playing the game wrong - 3 yr olds intervened using 'normative' language: 'shouldn't do that' or 'not how it goes'

norm enforcement in peer interactions - Koymen et al 2014 - step 2

- 3-5 yr olds 2 conditions: incompatible: given different rules compatible: same rules - normative conflict: 3 & 5 yr olds protested and corrected peers' actions - took longer for 3 year olds to resolve conflict and agree on rules - 3 year olds did not realize experimenter was the reason for disagreement - normative understanding gets more flexible in later years (5 year olds could agree on the alternative rules)

is normative enforcement universal - Kanngiesser at al 2021 - step 2

- 5-8 year olds from 8 diverse societies enforced conventional norms (game rules) when observing a peer broke them - norm enforcement of conventional norms is universal but style of enforcement varied across societies (imperative vs normative protest)

intervention against moral norm violations - step 2

- focused on property rights/norms - 2 & 3 year olds protested when it was their picture involved - only 3yr olds stood up for property rights for absent third party picture being broken - 2 year olds might not know its wrong/ fail to consider it would hurt someone else (failure of empathy/knowledge) or eve knew it was wrong but did it anyway (failure of inhibition/ didn't act on it)

do other species have normative understandings

- social group of chimpanzees when there is food in the middle, dominant chimp eats everything - its about dominance, out of fear they don't eat anything else - chimps don't have collective understanding

summary

- contrary to traditional views, young children are nor amoral agents - by age 3 children display sophisticated understanding of morality: 1) intervene to third-party norm violations 2) in interventions they use 'normative' protests highlighting obligation and gent-neutrality - agent-neutral understanding paves the way for larger social constructs and social institutions e.g. marriage, laws etc.

Lecture 8 Flashcards

Morality