Early Reputation Management: Three-Year-Old Children Are More Generous Following Exposure to Eyes

To enhance their reputations, adults and even 5-year-old children behave more prosocially when being observed by others. However, it remains unknown whether children younger than five also manage their reputations. One established paradigm for assessing reputation management is the ‘watching eyes pa...

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Main Authors: Caroline Kelsey, Tobias Grossmann, Amrisha Vaish
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Frontiers Media S.A. 2018-05-01
Series:Frontiers in Psychology
Subjects:
Online Access:http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00698/full
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spelling doaj-e4db1a33435548f9957addba82f8b6612020-11-24T21:21:47ZengFrontiers Media S.A.Frontiers in Psychology1664-10782018-05-01910.3389/fpsyg.2018.00698345016Early Reputation Management: Three-Year-Old Children Are More Generous Following Exposure to EyesCaroline KelseyTobias GrossmannAmrisha VaishTo enhance their reputations, adults and even 5-year-old children behave more prosocially when being observed by others. However, it remains unknown whether children younger than five also manage their reputations. One established paradigm for assessing reputation management is the ‘watching eyes paradigm,’ in which adults have been found to be more prosocial in the presence of eyes versus control images. However, the robustness of this effect in adults has recently been called into question, and it has never been demonstrated in children. In Study 1, we used a method similar to that used in prior work: 3- and 5-year-old children took part in a prosocial task while in the presence of an image of eyes or flowers but without explicit mention or reference to the image. With this method, children did not show the watching eyes effect. In Study 2, 3-year-old children were tested with a modified watching eyes paradigm, wherein they first explicitly interacted either with images of eyes or with cloth flowers, and they then engaged in a prosocial task. With this modified watching eyes paradigm, 3-year-olds showed the predicted effect: They were more prosocial following exposure to eyes than flowers. These results offer potential insight into the mixed findings across the adult literature, such that the manner of exposure, and specifically how explicit the exposure is, may influence the watching eyes effect. Finally, no study to date has examined whether cues of human presence other than the eyes also influence prosociality. We found that children in the Mouth condition were prosocial at an intermediate level between the Eyes and Flowers conditions. Overall, the findings point to the remarkably early emergence of reputation management in human ontogeny.http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00698/fullcooperationorosocial behaviorreputationself-presentationwatching eyes
collection DOAJ
language English
format Article
sources DOAJ
author Caroline Kelsey
Tobias Grossmann
Amrisha Vaish
spellingShingle Caroline Kelsey
Tobias Grossmann
Amrisha Vaish
Early Reputation Management: Three-Year-Old Children Are More Generous Following Exposure to Eyes
Frontiers in Psychology
cooperation
orosocial behavior
reputation
self-presentation
watching eyes
author_facet Caroline Kelsey
Tobias Grossmann
Amrisha Vaish
author_sort Caroline Kelsey
title Early Reputation Management: Three-Year-Old Children Are More Generous Following Exposure to Eyes
title_short Early Reputation Management: Three-Year-Old Children Are More Generous Following Exposure to Eyes
title_full Early Reputation Management: Three-Year-Old Children Are More Generous Following Exposure to Eyes
title_fullStr Early Reputation Management: Three-Year-Old Children Are More Generous Following Exposure to Eyes
title_full_unstemmed Early Reputation Management: Three-Year-Old Children Are More Generous Following Exposure to Eyes
title_sort early reputation management: three-year-old children are more generous following exposure to eyes
publisher Frontiers Media S.A.
series Frontiers in Psychology
issn 1664-1078
publishDate 2018-05-01
description To enhance their reputations, adults and even 5-year-old children behave more prosocially when being observed by others. However, it remains unknown whether children younger than five also manage their reputations. One established paradigm for assessing reputation management is the ‘watching eyes paradigm,’ in which adults have been found to be more prosocial in the presence of eyes versus control images. However, the robustness of this effect in adults has recently been called into question, and it has never been demonstrated in children. In Study 1, we used a method similar to that used in prior work: 3- and 5-year-old children took part in a prosocial task while in the presence of an image of eyes or flowers but without explicit mention or reference to the image. With this method, children did not show the watching eyes effect. In Study 2, 3-year-old children were tested with a modified watching eyes paradigm, wherein they first explicitly interacted either with images of eyes or with cloth flowers, and they then engaged in a prosocial task. With this modified watching eyes paradigm, 3-year-olds showed the predicted effect: They were more prosocial following exposure to eyes than flowers. These results offer potential insight into the mixed findings across the adult literature, such that the manner of exposure, and specifically how explicit the exposure is, may influence the watching eyes effect. Finally, no study to date has examined whether cues of human presence other than the eyes also influence prosociality. We found that children in the Mouth condition were prosocial at an intermediate level between the Eyes and Flowers conditions. Overall, the findings point to the remarkably early emergence of reputation management in human ontogeny.
topic cooperation
orosocial behavior
reputation
self-presentation
watching eyes
url http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00698/full
work_keys_str_mv AT carolinekelsey earlyreputationmanagementthreeyearoldchildrenaremoregenerousfollowingexposuretoeyes
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AT amrishavaish earlyreputationmanagementthreeyearoldchildrenaremoregenerousfollowingexposuretoeyes
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