Infants' evaluation of prosocial and antisocial agents: A meta-analysis

Developmental Psychology
Francesco Margoni, Luca Surian

Abstract

Over the past decade, numerous studies have reported that infants prefer prosocial agents (those who provide help, comfort, or fairness in distributive actions) to antisocial agents (those who harm others or distribute goods unfairly). We meta-analyzed the results of published and unpublished studies on infants aged 4-32 months and estimated that approximately two infants out of three, when given a choice between a prosocial and an antisocial agent, choose the former. This preference was not significantly affected by age or other factors, such as the type of dependent variable (selective reaching or helping) or the modality of stimulus presentation (cartoons or real events). Effect size was affected by the type of familiarization events: giving/taking actions increased its magnitude compared with helping/hindering actions. There was evidence of a publication bias, suggesting that the effect size in published studies is likely to be inflated. Also, the distribution of children who chose the prosocial agent in experiments with N = 16 suggested a file-drawer problem. (PsycINFO Database Record

Citations

Sep 6, 2018·Journal of Child Language·Laura FranchinLuca Surian
Jan 24, 2020·Developmental Science·Luca Surian, Francesco Margoni
Jan 14, 2020·Perspectives on Psychological Science : a Journal of the Association for Psychological Science·Arber Tasimi
Mar 27, 2020·The British Journal of Developmental Psychology·Wooyeol LeeHyun-Joo Song
May 21, 2020·Royal Society Open Science·Laura SchlingloffDenis Tatone
Apr 16, 2019·Frontiers in Psychology·Katherine McAuliffeLaurie R Santos
Oct 22, 2019·Frontiers in Psychology·Amir Cruz-KhaliliHenry D Schlinger
Jul 28, 2019·Nature Human Behaviour·Ashley J ThomasBarbara W Sarnecka
Sep 6, 2018·Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America·Francesco MargoniLuca Surian
Feb 23, 2020·Frontiers in Psychology·Luca Surian, Francesco Margoni
Sep 30, 2019·Current Opinion in Psychology·Jennifer Sheehy-Skeffington, Lotte Thomsen
Feb 5, 2021·Science Advances·R K BrüggerJ M Burkart
Jul 13, 2021·Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience·Marisa BiondiTeresa Wilcox
Sep 22, 2021·Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America·Fransisca Ting, Renée Baillargeon
Oct 10, 2021·Scientific Reports·Iris BerentJudit Gervain
Oct 12, 2021·Human Development·Audun DahlTalia Waltzer
Dec 8, 2021·Infancy : the Official Journal of the International Society on Infant Studies·Enda Tan, Jane Kiley Hamlin
Jul 16, 2021·Perspectives on Psychological Science : a Journal of the Association for Psychological Science·Cillian McHughElaine L Kinsella

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