{"id":176430,"date":"2015-11-18T13:00:09","date_gmt":"2015-11-18T18:00:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/webadmin.news-harvard.go-vip.net\/gazette\/gazette\/?p=176430"},"modified":"2015-11-18T13:00:09","modified_gmt":"2015-11-18T18:00:09","slug":"a-focus-on-fairness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/story\/2015\/11\/a-focus-on-fairness\/","title":{"rendered":"A focus on fairness"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\t\n\t
\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\tScience & Tech\t\t<\/a>\n\t\t\n\t\t

\n\t\tA focus on fairness\t<\/h1>\n\n\t\n\t\n\t
\n\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t

\n\t\tPeter Reuell\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t

\n\t\t\tHarvard Staff Writer\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/address>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t

\n\t\t\tStudy examines how children in various countries react to inequity \t\t<\/h2>\n\t\t\n<\/header>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\t\t

Fairness may be a necessity of human civilization, allowing people to share valuable resources. But does it develop the same way, and at the same pace, across all human cultures?<\/p>\n

A new Harvard study suggests that the answer may be no.<\/p>\n

Using a simple game in which candy is distributed between two players, researchers found that children around the globe were quick to reject deals unfair to themselves, but in three countries \u2014 the United States, Canada, and Uganda \u2014 they also were willing to reject deals unfair to others.<\/p>\n

The study, described in a paper released today in the journal Nature<\/a>, was done by senior author Felix Warneken, the John L. Loeb Associate Professor of the Social Sciences at Harvard, and co-authored by two former Harvard doctoral students, Peter Blake, now an assistant professor of psychology at Boston University, and Katie McAuliffe, an assistant professor of psychology at Boston College. Other contributors include Richard Wrangham, the Ruth B. Moore Professor of Biological Anthropology at Harvard; Elizabeth Ross, co-master of Currier House; undergraduate students Aleah Bowie and Hurnan Vongsachang; Warneken lab manager Lauren Kleutsch; and Karen Kramer, a faculty member at the University of Utah.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe had run studies exploring this idea \u2014 what we call inequity aversion \u2014 in the Boston area, but this type of study, looking at the cross-cultural specificity of it, had never been done before,\u201d said Warneken.<\/p>\n

In each test, two children \u2014 one designated as the actor and the other the recipient \u2014 were seated on opposite sides of a simple apparatus made up of two platforms and two handles. Researchers then placed rewards \u2014 candy \u2014 on the platforms in different distributions, some favoring the actor and some favoring the recipient.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn some trials, the distribution was one piece of candy for the actor and four for the recipient, and in others it was the other way around,\u201d Warneken explained. \u201cIf the actor decides to accept the distribution, they pull a green handle, the platforms tilt out, and they get the candy. If they reject it, they pull a red handle, the platforms tilt in, the candy falls into a bowl, and nobody gets any.\u201d<\/p>\n

In tests conducted in the Boston area, Blake and McAuliffe found that children\u2019s ages influenced how they reacted to various forms of inequity.<\/p>\n

In a reaction known as known as disadvantageous inequity aversion, young children were quick to reject distributions in which the other person received more candy. By about 8 years old, however, they also began to reject distributions that favored them, called advantageous inequity aversion.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat was a somewhat surprising finding, that kids were willing to make that type of sacrifice,\u201d Blake said. \u201cWhen we asked them why they did it, they said it was not fair.\u201d<\/p>\n

Spurred by those results, Blake and McAuliffe set out to understand whether inequity aversion could be found in other cultures, eventually running tests in Canada, India, Mexico, Peru, Senegal, Uganda, and the elsewhere in the United States.<\/p>\n

\u201cGiven that we see disadvantageous inequity aversion so young in the U.S., we thought it was more likely we would see it in all cultures, and indeed, that\u2019s what we found,\u201d McAuliffe said. \u201cThere was some variation in the age when it emerged, but we saw it everywhere.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rejections of allocations that favor the child, however, were observed in only three countries sampled: the United States, Canada and Uganda.<\/p>\n

\u201cGiven our previous results, you might not be terribly surprised to see it in the U.S. and Canada, but Uganda seems like an unusual finding,\u201d McAuliffe said.<\/p>\n

The dual finding, Blake and McAuliffe said, suggests that while disadvantageous inequity aversion may be a human universal, the opposite appears to be influenced by cultural norms.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a nice first step, and a large one, toward making the case that disadvantageous inequity aversion looks like a universal feature,\u201d Blake said. \u201cBut it\u2019s important to note that we were limited in the cultures we tested. We didn\u2019t test hunter-gatherers, for example, so there\u2019s always a possibility that we may not see this phenomenon in those cultures.\u201d<\/p>\n

Importantly, Warneken, Blake, and McAuliffe said, the study lays a foundation for future work by allowing researchers to target specific countries that may produce interesting results and to think deeply about how cultural differences may influence the development of fairness behaviors.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe conducted this study on a shoestring budget, which meant we worked with collaborators who already had access to the sites,\u201d Blake said. \u201cNow that we have a picture of what this looks like, and recognize that there are two different processes at work here, we can be more targeted on which cultures we want to study in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n

One idea going forward, Warneken said, would be to start with cultures in which adults have shown large differences in inequity aversion, and investigate whether those differences are also seen among children.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are not claiming that this advantageous inequity aversion does not exist in these cultures, it\u2019s only that we do not find it in childhood and early adolescence,\u201d Warneken said. \u201cIt could just be that this is something kids in the U.S., Canada, and Uganda are pushed towards early on, and we can speculate that in other cultures this is something that emerges later, when they are adults and engage in more of these economic exchanges.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n<\/div>\n\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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class=\"wp-block-post-author\">\n\t\t\t<address class=\"wp-block-post-author__content\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<p class=\"author wp-block-post-author__name\">\n\t\tPeter Reuell\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p class=\"wp-block-post-author__byline\">\n\t\t\tHarvard Staff Writer\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/address>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t<time class=\"article-header__date\" datetime=\"2015-11-18\">\n\t\t\tNovember 18, 2015\t\t<\/time>\n\n\t\t<span class=\"article-header__reading-time\">\n\t\t\t5 min read\t\t<\/span>\n\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\n\t\t\t<h2 class=\"article-header__subheading wp-block-heading\">\n\t\t\tStudy examines how children in various countries react to inequity \t\t<\/h2>\n\t\t\n<\/header>\n"},"2":{"blockName":"core\/group","attrs":{"templateLock":false,"metadata":{"name":"Article content"},"align":"wide","layout":{"type":"constrained","justifyContent":"center"},"tagName":"div","lock":[],"className":"","style":[],"backgroundColor":"","textColor":"","gradient":"","fontSize":"","fontFamily":"","borderColor":"","ariaLabel":"","anchor":""},"innerBlocks":[{"blockName":"core\/freeform","attrs":{"content":"","lock":[],"metadata":[]},"innerBlocks":[],"innerHTML":"\n\t\t<p>Fairness may be a necessity of human civilization, allowing people to share valuable resources. But does it develop the same way, and at the same pace, across all human cultures?<\/p>\n<p>A new Harvard study suggests that the answer may be no.<\/p>\n<p>Using a simple game in which candy is distributed between two players, researchers found that children around the globe were quick to reject deals unfair to themselves, but in three countries \u2014 the United States, Canada, and Uganda \u2014 they also were willing to reject deals unfair to others.<\/p>\n<p>The study, described in a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/nature\/journal\/vaop\/ncurrent\/full\/nature15703.html\">paper released today in the journal Nature<\/a>, was done by senior author Felix Warneken, the John L. Loeb Associate Professor of the Social Sciences at Harvard, and co-authored by two former Harvard doctoral students, Peter Blake, now an assistant professor of psychology at Boston University, and Katie McAuliffe, an assistant professor of psychology at Boston College. Other contributors include Richard Wrangham, the Ruth B. Moore Professor of Biological Anthropology at Harvard; Elizabeth Ross, co-master of Currier House; undergraduate students Aleah Bowie and Hurnan Vongsachang; Warneken lab manager Lauren Kleutsch; and Karen Kramer, a faculty member at the University of Utah.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe had run studies exploring this idea \u2014 what we call inequity aversion \u2014 in the Boston area, but this type of study, looking at the cross-cultural specificity of it, had never been done before,\u201d said Warneken.<\/p>\n<p>In each test, two children \u2014 one designated as the actor and the other the recipient \u2014 were seated on opposite sides of a simple apparatus made up of two platforms and two handles. Researchers then placed rewards \u2014 candy \u2014 on the platforms in different distributions, some favoring the actor and some favoring the recipient.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn some trials, the distribution was one piece of candy for the actor and four for the recipient, and in others it was the other way around,\u201d Warneken explained. \u201cIf the actor decides to accept the distribution, they pull a green handle, the platforms tilt out, and they get the candy. If they reject it, they pull a red handle, the platforms tilt in, the candy falls into a bowl, and nobody gets any.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In tests conducted in the Boston area, Blake and McAuliffe found that children\u2019s ages influenced how they reacted to various forms of inequity.<\/p>\n<p>In a reaction known as known as disadvantageous inequity aversion, young children were quick to reject distributions in which the other person received more candy. By about 8 years old, however, they also began to reject distributions that favored them, called advantageous inequity aversion.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat was a somewhat surprising finding, that kids were willing to make that type of sacrifice,\u201d Blake said. \u201cWhen we asked them why they did it, they said it was not fair.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Spurred by those results, Blake and McAuliffe set out to understand whether inequity aversion could be found in other cultures, eventually running tests in Canada, India, Mexico, Peru, Senegal, Uganda, and the elsewhere in the United States.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cGiven that we see disadvantageous inequity aversion so young in the U.S., we thought it was more likely we would see it in all cultures, and indeed, that\u2019s what we found,\u201d McAuliffe said. \u201cThere was some variation in the age when it emerged, but we saw it everywhere.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Rejections of allocations that favor the child, however, were observed in only three countries sampled: the United States, Canada and Uganda.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cGiven our previous results, you might not be terribly surprised to see it in the U.S. and Canada, but Uganda seems like an unusual finding,\u201d McAuliffe said.<\/p>\n<p>The dual finding, Blake and McAuliffe said, suggests that while disadvantageous inequity aversion may be a human universal, the opposite appears to be influenced by cultural norms.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is a nice first step, and a large one, toward making the case that disadvantageous inequity aversion looks like a universal feature,\u201d Blake said. \u201cBut it\u2019s important to note that we were limited in the cultures we tested. We didn\u2019t test hunter-gatherers, for example, so there\u2019s always a possibility that we may not see this phenomenon in those cultures.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Importantly, Warneken, Blake, and McAuliffe said, the study lays a foundation for future work by allowing researchers to target specific countries that may produce interesting results and to think deeply about how cultural differences may influence the development of fairness behaviors.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe conducted this study on a shoestring budget, which meant we worked with collaborators who already had access to the sites,\u201d Blake said. \u201cNow that we have a picture of what this looks like, and recognize that there are two different processes at work here, we can be more targeted on which cultures we want to study in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>One idea going forward, Warneken said, would be to start with cultures in which adults have shown large differences in inequity aversion, and investigate whether those differences are also seen among children.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are not claiming that this advantageous inequity aversion does not exist in these cultures, it\u2019s only that we do not find it in childhood and early adolescence,\u201d Warneken said. \u201cIt could just be that this is something kids in the U.S., Canada, and Uganda are pushed towards early on, and we can speculate that in other cultures this is something that emerges later, when they are adults and engage in more of these economic exchanges.\u201d<\/p>\n","innerContent":["\n\t\t<p>Fairness may be a necessity of human civilization, allowing people to share valuable resources. But does it develop the same way, and at the same pace, across all human cultures?<\/p>\n<p>A new Harvard study suggests that the answer may be no.<\/p>\n<p>Using a simple game in which candy is distributed between two players, researchers found that children around the globe were quick to reject deals unfair to themselves, but in three countries \u2014 the United States, Canada, and Uganda \u2014 they also were willing to reject deals unfair to others.<\/p>\n<p>The study, described in a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/nature\/journal\/vaop\/ncurrent\/full\/nature15703.html\">paper released today in the journal Nature<\/a>, was done by senior author Felix Warneken, the John L. Loeb Associate Professor of the Social Sciences at Harvard, and co-authored by two former Harvard doctoral students, Peter Blake, now an assistant professor of psychology at Boston University, and Katie McAuliffe, an assistant professor of psychology at Boston College. Other contributors include Richard Wrangham, the Ruth B. Moore Professor of Biological Anthropology at Harvard; Elizabeth Ross, co-master of Currier House; undergraduate students Aleah Bowie and Hurnan Vongsachang; Warneken lab manager Lauren Kleutsch; and Karen Kramer, a faculty member at the University of Utah.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe had run studies exploring this idea \u2014 what we call inequity aversion \u2014 in the Boston area, but this type of study, looking at the cross-cultural specificity of it, had never been done before,\u201d said Warneken.<\/p>\n<p>In each test, two children \u2014 one designated as the actor and the other the recipient \u2014 were seated on opposite sides of a simple apparatus made up of two platforms and two handles. Researchers then placed rewards \u2014 candy \u2014 on the platforms in different distributions, some favoring the actor and some favoring the recipient.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn some trials, the distribution was one piece of candy for the actor and four for the recipient, and in others it was the other way around,\u201d Warneken explained. \u201cIf the actor decides to accept the distribution, they pull a green handle, the platforms tilt out, and they get the candy. If they reject it, they pull a red handle, the platforms tilt in, the candy falls into a bowl, and nobody gets any.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In tests conducted in the Boston area, Blake and McAuliffe found that children\u2019s ages influenced how they reacted to various forms of inequity.<\/p>\n<p>In a reaction known as known as disadvantageous inequity aversion, young children were quick to reject distributions in which the other person received more candy. By about 8 years old, however, they also began to reject distributions that favored them, called advantageous inequity aversion.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat was a somewhat surprising finding, that kids were willing to make that type of sacrifice,\u201d Blake said. \u201cWhen we asked them why they did it, they said it was not fair.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Spurred by those results, Blake and McAuliffe set out to understand whether inequity aversion could be found in other cultures, eventually running tests in Canada, India, Mexico, Peru, Senegal, Uganda, and the elsewhere in the United States.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cGiven that we see disadvantageous inequity aversion so young in the U.S., we thought it was more likely we would see it in all cultures, and indeed, that\u2019s what we found,\u201d McAuliffe said. \u201cThere was some variation in the age when it emerged, but we saw it everywhere.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Rejections of allocations that favor the child, however, were observed in only three countries sampled: the United States, Canada and Uganda.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cGiven our previous results, you might not be terribly surprised to see it in the U.S. and Canada, but Uganda seems like an unusual finding,\u201d McAuliffe said.<\/p>\n<p>The dual finding, Blake and McAuliffe said, suggests that while disadvantageous inequity aversion may be a human universal, the opposite appears to be influenced by cultural norms.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is a nice first step, and a large one, toward making the case that disadvantageous inequity aversion looks like a universal feature,\u201d Blake said. \u201cBut it\u2019s important to note that we were limited in the cultures we tested. We didn\u2019t test hunter-gatherers, for example, so there\u2019s always a possibility that we may not see this phenomenon in those cultures.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Importantly, Warneken, Blake, and McAuliffe said, the study lays a foundation for future work by allowing researchers to target specific countries that may produce interesting results and to think deeply about how cultural differences may influence the development of fairness behaviors.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe conducted this study on a shoestring budget, which meant we worked with collaborators who already had access to the sites,\u201d Blake said. \u201cNow that we have a picture of what this looks like, and recognize that there are two different processes at work here, we can be more targeted on which cultures we want to study in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>One idea going forward, Warneken said, would be to start with cultures in which adults have shown large differences in inequity aversion, and investigate whether those differences are also seen among children.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are not claiming that this advantageous inequity aversion does not exist in these cultures, it\u2019s only that we do not find it in childhood and early adolescence,\u201d Warneken said. \u201cIt could just be that this is something kids in the U.S., Canada, and Uganda are pushed towards early on, and we can speculate that in other cultures this is something that emerges later, when they are adults and engage in more of these economic exchanges.\u201d<\/p>\n"],"rendered":"\n\t\t<p>Fairness may be a necessity of human civilization, allowing people to share valuable resources. But does it develop the same way, and at the same pace, across all human cultures?<\/p>\n<p>A new Harvard study suggests that the answer may be no.<\/p>\n<p>Using a simple game in which candy is distributed between two players, researchers found that children around the globe were quick to reject deals unfair to themselves, but in three countries \u2014 the United States, Canada, and Uganda \u2014 they also were willing to reject deals unfair to others.<\/p>\n<p>The study, described in a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/nature\/journal\/vaop\/ncurrent\/full\/nature15703.html\">paper released today in the journal Nature<\/a>, was done by senior author Felix Warneken, the John L. Loeb Associate Professor of the Social Sciences at Harvard, and co-authored by two former Harvard doctoral students, Peter Blake, now an assistant professor of psychology at Boston University, and Katie McAuliffe, an assistant professor of psychology at Boston College. Other contributors include Richard Wrangham, the Ruth B. Moore Professor of Biological Anthropology at Harvard; Elizabeth Ross, co-master of Currier House; undergraduate students Aleah Bowie and Hurnan Vongsachang; Warneken lab manager Lauren Kleutsch; and Karen Kramer, a faculty member at the University of Utah.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe had run studies exploring this idea \u2014 what we call inequity aversion \u2014 in the Boston area, but this type of study, looking at the cross-cultural specificity of it, had never been done before,\u201d said Warneken.<\/p>\n<p>In each test, two children \u2014 one designated as the actor and the other the recipient \u2014 were seated on opposite sides of a simple apparatus made up of two platforms and two handles. Researchers then placed rewards \u2014 candy \u2014 on the platforms in different distributions, some favoring the actor and some favoring the recipient.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn some trials, the distribution was one piece of candy for the actor and four for the recipient, and in others it was the other way around,\u201d Warneken explained. \u201cIf the actor decides to accept the distribution, they pull a green handle, the platforms tilt out, and they get the candy. If they reject it, they pull a red handle, the platforms tilt in, the candy falls into a bowl, and nobody gets any.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In tests conducted in the Boston area, Blake and McAuliffe found that children\u2019s ages influenced how they reacted to various forms of inequity.<\/p>\n<p>In a reaction known as known as disadvantageous inequity aversion, young children were quick to reject distributions in which the other person received more candy. By about 8 years old, however, they also began to reject distributions that favored them, called advantageous inequity aversion.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat was a somewhat surprising finding, that kids were willing to make that type of sacrifice,\u201d Blake said. \u201cWhen we asked them why they did it, they said it was not fair.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Spurred by those results, Blake and McAuliffe set out to understand whether inequity aversion could be found in other cultures, eventually running tests in Canada, India, Mexico, Peru, Senegal, Uganda, and the elsewhere in the United States.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cGiven that we see disadvantageous inequity aversion so young in the U.S., we thought it was more likely we would see it in all cultures, and indeed, that\u2019s what we found,\u201d McAuliffe said. \u201cThere was some variation in the age when it emerged, but we saw it everywhere.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Rejections of allocations that favor the child, however, were observed in only three countries sampled: the United States, Canada and Uganda.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cGiven our previous results, you might not be terribly surprised to see it in the U.S. and Canada, but Uganda seems like an unusual finding,\u201d McAuliffe said.<\/p>\n<p>The dual finding, Blake and McAuliffe said, suggests that while disadvantageous inequity aversion may be a human universal, the opposite appears to be influenced by cultural norms.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is a nice first step, and a large one, toward making the case that disadvantageous inequity aversion looks like a universal feature,\u201d Blake said. \u201cBut it\u2019s important to note that we were limited in the cultures we tested. We didn\u2019t test hunter-gatherers, for example, so there\u2019s always a possibility that we may not see this phenomenon in those cultures.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Importantly, Warneken, Blake, and McAuliffe said, the study lays a foundation for future work by allowing researchers to target specific countries that may produce interesting results and to think deeply about how cultural differences may influence the development of fairness behaviors.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe conducted this study on a shoestring budget, which meant we worked with collaborators who already had access to the sites,\u201d Blake said. \u201cNow that we have a picture of what this looks like, and recognize that there are two different processes at work here, we can be more targeted on which cultures we want to study in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>One idea going forward, Warneken said, would be to start with cultures in which adults have shown large differences in inequity aversion, and investigate whether those differences are also seen among children.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are not claiming that this advantageous inequity aversion does not exist in these cultures, it\u2019s only that we do not find it in childhood and early adolescence,\u201d Warneken said. \u201cIt could just be that this is something kids in the U.S., Canada, and Uganda are pushed towards early on, and we can speculate that in other cultures this is something that emerges later, when they are adults and engage in more of these economic exchanges.\u201d<\/p>\n"}],"innerHTML":"\n<div class=\"wp-block-group alignwide\">\n\n\n\n<\/div>\n","innerContent":["\n<div class=\"wp-block-group alignwide\">\n\n","\n\n<\/div>\n"],"rendered":"\n<div class=\"wp-block-group alignwide has-global-padding is-content-justification-center is-layout-constrained wp-block-group-is-layout-constrained\">\n\n\n\t\t<p>Fairness may be a necessity of human civilization, allowing people to share valuable resources. But does it develop the same way, and at the same pace, across all human cultures?<\/p>\n<p>A new Harvard study suggests that the answer may be no.<\/p>\n<p>Using a simple game in which candy is distributed between two players, researchers found that children around the globe were quick to reject deals unfair to themselves, but in three countries \u2014 the United States, Canada, and Uganda \u2014 they also were willing to reject deals unfair to others.<\/p>\n<p>The study, described in a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/nature\/journal\/vaop\/ncurrent\/full\/nature15703.html\">paper released today in the journal Nature<\/a>, was done by senior author Felix Warneken, the John L. Loeb Associate Professor of the Social Sciences at Harvard, and co-authored by two former Harvard doctoral students, Peter Blake, now an assistant professor of psychology at Boston University, and Katie McAuliffe, an assistant professor of psychology at Boston College. Other contributors include Richard Wrangham, the Ruth B. Moore Professor of Biological Anthropology at Harvard; Elizabeth Ross, co-master of Currier House; undergraduate students Aleah Bowie and Hurnan Vongsachang; Warneken lab manager Lauren Kleutsch; and Karen Kramer, a faculty member at the University of Utah.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe had run studies exploring this idea \u2014 what we call inequity aversion \u2014 in the Boston area, but this type of study, looking at the cross-cultural specificity of it, had never been done before,\u201d said Warneken.<\/p>\n<p>In each test, two children \u2014 one designated as the actor and the other the recipient \u2014 were seated on opposite sides of a simple apparatus made up of two platforms and two handles. Researchers then placed rewards \u2014 candy \u2014 on the platforms in different distributions, some favoring the actor and some favoring the recipient.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn some trials, the distribution was one piece of candy for the actor and four for the recipient, and in others it was the other way around,\u201d Warneken explained. \u201cIf the actor decides to accept the distribution, they pull a green handle, the platforms tilt out, and they get the candy. If they reject it, they pull a red handle, the platforms tilt in, the candy falls into a bowl, and nobody gets any.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In tests conducted in the Boston area, Blake and McAuliffe found that children\u2019s ages influenced how they reacted to various forms of inequity.<\/p>\n<p>In a reaction known as known as disadvantageous inequity aversion, young children were quick to reject distributions in which the other person received more candy. By about 8 years old, however, they also began to reject distributions that favored them, called advantageous inequity aversion.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat was a somewhat surprising finding, that kids were willing to make that type of sacrifice,\u201d Blake said. \u201cWhen we asked them why they did it, they said it was not fair.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Spurred by those results, Blake and McAuliffe set out to understand whether inequity aversion could be found in other cultures, eventually running tests in Canada, India, Mexico, Peru, Senegal, Uganda, and the elsewhere in the United States.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cGiven that we see disadvantageous inequity aversion so young in the U.S., we thought it was more likely we would see it in all cultures, and indeed, that\u2019s what we found,\u201d McAuliffe said. \u201cThere was some variation in the age when it emerged, but we saw it everywhere.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Rejections of allocations that favor the child, however, were observed in only three countries sampled: the United States, Canada and Uganda.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cGiven our previous results, you might not be terribly surprised to see it in the U.S. and Canada, but Uganda seems like an unusual finding,\u201d McAuliffe said.<\/p>\n<p>The dual finding, Blake and McAuliffe said, suggests that while disadvantageous inequity aversion may be a human universal, the opposite appears to be influenced by cultural norms.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is a nice first step, and a large one, toward making the case that disadvantageous inequity aversion looks like a universal feature,\u201d Blake said. \u201cBut it\u2019s important to note that we were limited in the cultures we tested. We didn\u2019t test hunter-gatherers, for example, so there\u2019s always a possibility that we may not see this phenomenon in those cultures.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Importantly, Warneken, Blake, and McAuliffe said, the study lays a foundation for future work by allowing researchers to target specific countries that may produce interesting results and to think deeply about how cultural differences may influence the development of fairness behaviors.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe conducted this study on a shoestring budget, which meant we worked with collaborators who already had access to the sites,\u201d Blake said. \u201cNow that we have a picture of what this looks like, and recognize that there are two different processes at work here, we can be more targeted on which cultures we want to study in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>One idea going forward, Warneken said, would be to start with cultures in which adults have shown large differences in inequity aversion, and investigate whether those differences are also seen among children.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are not claiming that this advantageous inequity aversion does not exist in these cultures, it\u2019s only that we do not find it in childhood and early adolescence,\u201d Warneken said. \u201cIt could just be that this is something kids in the U.S., Canada, and Uganda are pushed towards early on, and we can speculate that in other cultures this is something that emerges later, when they are adults and engage in more of these economic exchanges.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n<\/div>\n"}},"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":159774,"url":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/story\/2014\/08\/fighting-unfairness\/","url_meta":{"origin":176430,"position":0},"title":"Fighting unfairness","author":"harvardgazette","date":"August 18, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"A new study by Harvard scientists suggests that, from a young age, children are biased in favor of their own social groups when they intervene in what they believe are unfair situations. But as they get older, they can learn to become more impartial.","rel":"","context":"In "Science & Tech"","block_context":{"text":"Science & Tech","link":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/section\/science-technology\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/08\/081214_fairness_study_605.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/08\/081214_fairness_study_605.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/08\/081214_fairness_study_605.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":85697,"url":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/story\/2011\/06\/just-rewards\/","url_meta":{"origin":176430,"position":1},"title":"Just rewards","author":"harvardgazette","date":"June 28, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"A Harvard University study built around an innovative economic game indicates that, at least for our younger selves, the desire for equity often trumps the urge to maximize rewards.","rel":"","context":"In "Science & Tech"","block_context":{"text":"Science & Tech","link":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/section\/science-technology\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/06\/061511_rewards_019_605.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/06\/061511_rewards_019_605.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/06\/061511_rewards_019_605.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":116986,"url":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/story\/2012\/09\/kids-merit\/","url_meta":{"origin":176430,"position":2},"title":"Figuring out fairness","author":"harvardgazette","date":"September 13, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"A new Harvard study suggests that children as young as 3 consider merit \u2014 a key part of more-advanced ideas of fairness \u2014 when distributing resources.","rel":"","context":"In "Science & Tech"","block_context":{"text":"Science & Tech","link":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/section\/science-technology\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/09\/090612_warneken_felix_013_605.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/09\/090612_warneken_felix_013_605.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/09\/090612_warneken_felix_013_605.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":128515,"url":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/story\/2013\/01\/when-fairness-prevails\/","url_meta":{"origin":176430,"position":3},"title":"When fairness prevails","author":"harvardgazette","date":"January 30, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Using computer simulations designed to play a simple economic \u201cgame,\u201d researchers at Harvard\u2019s Program for Evolutionary Dynamics showed that uncertainty is a key ingredient behind fairness. Their work is described in a Jan. 21 paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.","rel":"","context":"In "Science & Tech"","block_context":{"text":"Science & Tech","link":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/section\/science-technology\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/092812_co_op_026_605.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/092812_co_op_026_605.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/092812_co_op_026_605.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":169945,"url":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/story\/2015\/06\/cooking-up-cognition\/","url_meta":{"origin":176430,"position":4},"title":"Cooking up cognition","author":"harvardgazette","date":"June 3, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"A new study suggests that many of the cognitive capacities that humans use for cooking \u2014 a preference for cooked food, the ability to understand the transformation of raw food into cooked, and even the ability to save and transport food to cook it \u2014 are shared with chimpanzees.","rel":"","context":"In "Science & Tech"","block_context":{"text":"Science & Tech","link":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/section\/science-technology\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/050115_chimps_083_605.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/050115_chimps_083_605.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/050115_chimps_083_605.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":151102,"url":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/story\/2014\/01\/something-doesnt-smell-right\/","url_meta":{"origin":176430,"position":5},"title":"Something doesn\u2019t smell right","author":"harvardgazette","date":"January 15, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Harvard scientists say they\u2019re closer to unraveling one of the most basic questions in neuroscience \u2014 how the brain encodes likes and dislikes \u2014 with the discovery of the first receptors in any species evolved to detect cadaverine and putrescine, two of the chemical byproducts responsible for the distinctive \u2014\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Health"","block_context":{"text":"Health","link":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/section\/health\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/011314_liberles_605.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/011314_liberles_605.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/011314_liberles_605.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176430","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/105622744"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=176430"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176430\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/176443"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=176430"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=176430"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=176430"},{"taxonomy":"format","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/gazette-formats?post=176430"},{"taxonomy":"series","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/series?post=176430"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}