Journal
JOURNAL OF EXPERIMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY-GENERAL
Volume 149, Issue 1, Pages 182-191Publisher
AMER PSYCHOLOGICAL ASSOC
DOI: 10.1037/xge0000613
Keywords
third-party punishment; reputation; cooperation; fairness; development
Categories
Funding
- Research Challenge Grant for Women in Science
- James S. McDonnell Foundation 21st Century Science Initiative in Understanding Human Cognition-Scholar Award
- National Science Foundation [1349089]
- Children's Museum of Manhattan
- Direct For Social, Behav & Economic Scie
- Division Of Behavioral and Cognitive Sci [1349089] Funding Source: National Science Foundation
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Humans' evolutionary success has depended in part on their willingness to punish, at personal cost, bad actors who have not harmed them directly-a behavior known as costly third-party punishment. The present studies examined the psychological processes underlying this behavior from a developmental perspective, using a novel, naturalistic method. In these studies (ages 3-6, total N = 225), participants of all ages enacted costly punishment, and rates of punishment increased with age. In addition, younger children (ages 3-4), when in a position of authority, were more likely to punish members of their own group, whereas older children (ages 5-6) showed no group- or authority-based differences. These findings demonstrate the developmental emergence of costly punishment, and show how a sense of authority can foster the kind of group-regulatory behavior that costly punishment may have evolved to serve.
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