Young children do not perceive distributional fairness as a moral norm.
Meltem Yucel, Marissa B. Drell, Vikram K. Jaswal, Amrisha Vaish
Abstract
= 94), 4-year-olds rated moral transgressions (e.g., hitting) as more serious than fairness and conventional transgressions (e.g., wearing pajamas to school), but importantly, they rated fairness and conventional transgressions as similarly serious. In contrast, 6- and 8-year-olds rated moral transgressions as more serious than fairness and conventional transgressions, and fairness as more serious than conventional transgressions. An additional, forced-choice procedure revealed that most 6-year-olds also categorized fairness with moral rather than conventional transgressions; 4- and 8-year-olds' responses on this measure did not show systematic patterns. U.S. American children may not equate norms of fairness in resource distribution with harm-based moral norms, even into middle childhood. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).