Fairness

Fairness in Infants and Animals

Learning Goals

  • Objective 1: Describe infant studies investigating intuitions about how rewards are distributed.

  • Objective 2: Explain behavioral findings with children regarding their endorsement of inequality.

  • Objective 3: Summarize research on inequity in monkeys and discuss key criticisms of those studies.

Prosocial Behavior

  • Definition:

    • Acts such as helping, sharing, comforting, and informing.

Infant Studies on Fairness

  • Study Reference: Fairness Expectations and Altruistic Sharing in 15-Month-Old Human Infants (Schmidt & Sommerville, 2011).

Schematic of the VOE Paradigm

  • Overview of Experiment Procedure:

    • Participants observed during three phases:

    1. Introductory Phase:

      • Distributor greets recipients and lifts bowl of 4 crackers or pitcher with 10 ounces of milk, saying "Yummy!".

    2. Distribution Phase:

      • Allocation occurs to two recipients (equal distribution).

    3. Test Phase:

      • Participants witness fair (D: 2 crackers each) and unfair (E: 3 crackers to one, 1 cracker to another) outcomes.

        • Neutral facial expressions of actors shown.

        • Results displayed in a post-test graph distinguishing fair/symmetrical and unfair/asymmetrical scenarios.

  • Data Representation: Mean looking times measured in seconds for fair vs. unfair distributions highlighted.

Age Factors in Fairness Expectation

  • Study Reference: Ziv & Sommerville, 2017; Child Development.

  • Findings:

    • Proportions of attention to unequal outcomes change with age (6 months, 9 months, 12-15 months).

    • Graphical data illustrates attention shifts as children age.

    • Developmental trajectory doesn’t necessarily mean not innate

Influence of Sharing Experience

  • Hypothesis: Could prior experience with sharing affect outcomes when judged unfair?

  • Findings by Category:

    • No sharing: higher looking proportion toward unfair outcomes.

    • Sharing by Primary caregivers and Other individuals: Impact on judgment of inequality.

Infants’ Sense of Fairness

Empirical Study: Sloane et al., 2012

  • Methodology:

    • Experimental conditions utilize toy duck, cookies, and toycars between giraffe puppets to illustrate equal vs. unequal distribution.

  • Test Result:

    • Infants show reactions towards creation of fairness vs. inequality across conditions.

Key Findings from Experiment 1

  • Event Types Discussed:

    1. Unequal Event:

    • Excited reactions hinge on the distribution of items to puppets.

    1. Equal Event:

    • Similar positive reactions noted.

  • Outcome Observation:

    • Indicated understanding of fairness by infants.

Conclusion of Sloane et al. Study

  • Infants showed expectation violations when equally rewarding a worker and a slacker, even without explicit contracts.

  • Infants discern between roles during the experiment and anticipate fairness in reward distribution.

Behavioral Economics - Children’s Sharing Decisions

Game Structures:

  1. Dictator Game:

    • One player divides resources; other player has no input. Reflects altruism and fairness decisions.

  2. Ultimatum Game:

    • Proposes a division; responder can accept/reject (if reject, both get nothing). Validates fairness and punitive responses.

  3. Third-Party Punishment Game:

    • Observer can spend their own resources to punish unfair splits. Highlights moral considerations and norm adherence.

Developmental Perspectives on Prosocial Behavior

Study Reference: Ibbotson, 2014

  • Data Measurement: Mean offers (%) across different demographics analyzed through age groups (0 to 21 years).

  • Across every community, slope is positive with age (children learning fairness norms as they get older).

  • Differs from other study bc its a behavior rather than an expectation of how others will react.

Endorsement of Inequality

Focus: Disadvantageous Inequity Aversion

  • Study by Blake and McAuliffe, 2011

  • Inequity game where researcher distributes skittles unequally, child can reject or accept the distribution. If child rejects distribution, no one gets anything.

  • Findings depict a model of rejection preferences based on both equal and unequal outcomes among age groups and varying inequalities.

The Ontogeny of Fairness in Societies

Study Reference: Blake et al., 2015

  • Experimental findings on fairness reactions across a spectrum of cultures (Canada, India, etc.) tracked.

  • Expectations and age correlated to equity reactions were mapped as potential indicators of fairness development.

  • Rejection of advantageous inequality dependent on cultural norms

Monkeys and Fairness Research

  • Reference: Why monkeys (and humans) are wired for fairness | Sarah Brosnan (TED Talk).

  • Discussed connections between transcendental fairness attributes observed in both species.

Controversies in Fairness Studies

  • Arguments:

    • Rejections by individuals might reflect seeing a better food and wanting it, rather than an innate sense of fairness or social comparison influences.

    • Mixed results in replicative studies indicate the variability based on context, species studied, and research design.

    • Anthropomorphism concerns—assertions suggesting that primates react out of frustration rather than moral context.

    • The complexity of mapping monkey behavior to human social dynamics due to differing reactions toward advantageous and disadvantageous inequalities (monkeys react only to DI)