Children avoid inefficient but fair partners in a cooperative game.

ABSTRACT: Human adults use a range of social cues to obtain information about potential partners in cooperative contexts: we prefer partners who are competent, wealthy and generous, and those who abide by moral and social rules. One factor that carries particular weight is whether a prospective partner is fair. Here we ask whether children share this preference for fair partners and, if so, whether a prospective partner's past fair behaviour influences children's behaviour in a cooperative dilemma. Six- to nine-year-olds chose between partners who accepted or rejected resource allocations that were either strongly advantageously unequal, strongly disadvantageously unequal, or equal. They then played a one-shot Prisoner's Dilemma Game with their chosen partner. Children overwhelmingly preferred to pl

SUBMITTER: Pretot L 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7324404 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature