Children's Developing Commitments to Joint Goals

This study investigated young children's commitment to a joint goal by assessing whether peers in collaborative activities continue to collaborate until all received their rewards. Forty-eight 2.5-and 3.5-year-old children worked on an apparatus dyadically. One child got access to her reward ea...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Child development 2012-01, Vol.83 (1), p.137-145
Main Authors: Hamann, Katharina, Warneken, Felix, Tomasello, Michael
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adults
Age
Age Differences
Age Factors
Biological and medical sciences
Child
Child Day Care Centers
Child Development
Child psychology
Child, Preschool
Children
Collaboration
Commitments
Comprehension
Cooperation
Cooperative Behavior
Developmental psychology
Dyadic relations
EMPIRICAL ARTICLES
Empirical research
Experimentation
Female
Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology
Games
Goal Orientation
Goals
Humans
Male
Normativity
Objectives
Peer Group
Peers
Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry
Psychology. Psychophysiology
Reward
Rewards
Social behaviour
Social norms
Socialization
Toddlers
Toys
Young children
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Summary:This study investigated young children's commitment to a joint goal by assessing whether peers in collaborative activities continue to collaborate until all received their rewards. Forty-eight 2.5-and 3.5-year-old children worked on an apparatus dyadically. One child got access to her reward early. For the partner to benefit as well, this child had to continue to collaborate even though there was no further reward available to her. The study found that 3.5-year-olds, but not 2.5-year-olds, eagerly assisted their unlucky partner. They did this less readily in a noncollaborative control condition. A second study confirmed that 2.5-year-old children understood the task structure. These results suggest that children begin to appreciate the normative dimensions of collaborative activities during the 3rd year of life.
ISSN:0009-3920
1467-8624
DOI:10.1111/j.1467-8624.2011.01695.x