Groups as institutions: The use of constitutive rules to attribute group membership

Across four experiments we tested children's (N = 229, aged 4–9) beliefs about what makes an individual a member of a group. One model (groups as institutions) predicts children believe groups are based on constitutive rules, i.e. collectively agreed-upon rules that ground membership. Another m...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Cognition 2020-03, Vol.196, p.104143-104143, Article 104143
Main Authors: Noyes, Alexander, Dunham, Yarrow
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Attributes
Children
Children & youth
Conceptual development
Intuitive theories
Membership
Older children
Social categories
Social development
Social groups
Social organization
Social relations
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Summary:Across four experiments we tested children's (N = 229, aged 4–9) beliefs about what makes an individual a member of a group. One model (groups as institutions) predicts children believe groups are based on constitutive rules, i.e. collectively agreed-upon rules that ground membership. Another model (groups as social network) predicts children believe groups are based on patterns of social relationships. We tested whether and to what extent children rely on constitutive rules to attribute group membership. We found that young children can reason about constitutive rules as a means of becoming a group member, and their reasoning about constitutive rules is relatively sophisticated (Studies 1–3). But, when constitutive rules are pitted against friendship, young children (4–5) prioritize friendship and older children (6–9) prioritize constitutive rules. Therefore, both models contribute to the understanding of children's concepts of social groups across development.
ISSN:0010-0277
1873-7838
DOI:10.1016/j.cognition.2019.104143