Department of Psychology, University of York, York, UK.
Institute of Human Origins, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, USA.
Proc Biol Sci. 2020 Apr 29;287(1925):20192794. doi: 10.1098/rspb.2019.2794. Epub 2020 Apr 22.
Human cooperation is probably supported by our tendency to punish selfishness in others. Social norms play an important role in motivating third-party punishment (TPP), and also in explaining societal differences in prosocial behaviour. However, there has been little work directly linking social norms to the development of TPP across societies. In this study, we explored the impact of normative information on the development of TPP in 603 children aged 4-14, across six diverse societies. Children began to perform TPP during middle childhood, and the developmental trajectories of this behaviour were similar across societies. We also found that social norms began to influence the likelihood of performing TPP during middle childhood in some of these societies. Norms specifying the punishment of selfishness were generally more influential than norms specifying the punishment of prosocial behaviour. These findings support the view that TPP of selfishness is important in all societies, and its development is shaped by a shared psychology for responding to normative information. Yet, the results also highlight the important role that children's prior knowledge of local norms may play in explaining societal variation in the development of both TPP and prosociality.
人类合作可能是由我们惩罚他人自私行为的倾向所支持的。社会规范在激发第三方惩罚（TPP）方面起着重要作用，也可以解释社会中亲社会行为的差异。然而，很少有研究直接将社会规范与不同社会中的 TPP 发展联系起来。在这项研究中，我们探索了规范信息对 603 名 4-14 岁儿童 TPP 发展的影响，这些儿童来自六个不同的社会。儿童在童年中期开始进行 TPP，并且这种行为的发展轨迹在不同社会中是相似的。我们还发现，在其中一些社会中，社会规范开始影响在童年中期进行 TPP 的可能性。规定惩罚自私行为的规范通常比规定惩罚亲社会行为的规范更具影响力。这些发现支持了这样一种观点，即对自私行为的 TPP 在所有社会中都很重要，其发展受到一种共同的心理的影响，这种心理用于对规范信息做出反应。然而，结果也强调了儿童对当地规范的先验知识在解释 TPP 和亲社会行为的发展方面的重要作用。
