What Makes Children Defy Majorities? The Role of Dissenters in Chinese and Spanish Preschoolers' Social Judgments

In the presence and absence of conflicting testimony, children's selective trust in the in-group informant in moral judgment and knowledge access

In this study, we assessed whether the trust model formed by children in a moral judgment context with an inaccurate in-group informant affected their corresponding trust model in the knowledge access context and whether conditions (the presence of conflicting testimony: an inaccurate in-group informant paired with an accurate out-group informant; the absence of conflicting testimony: only an inaccurate in-group informant) influenced the trust model. Children aged 3 to 6 years (N = 215; 108 girls) in blue T-shirts as in-group members completed selective trust tasks in the moral judgment and knowledge access contexts. Results for moral judgment showed that children under both conditions were more likely to trust informants based on accurate judgments and gave less consideration to group identity. Results for knowledge access showed that in the presence of conflicting testimony, 3- and 4-year-olds trusted the in-group informant at chance, but 5- and 6-year-olds trusted the accurate informant. In the absence of conflicting testimony, 3- and 4-year-olds agreed more with the inaccurate in-group informant, but 5- and 6-year-olds trusted the in-group informant at chance. The results indicated that older children considered the accuracy of the informant's previous moral judgment for selective trust in the context of knowledge access while ignoring group identity, but that younger children were affected by in-group identity. The study found that 3- to 6-year-olds' trust in inaccurate in-group informants was conditional and that their trust choices appeared to be experimentally conditioned, domain specific, and age differentiated.

“Music is…”?! Significations attributed by middle school students to the notion of music

This article presents the data of the significations attributed by students from the eighth year of Middle School to the notion of Music. Anchored in the Piagetian clinical–critical method and in the contribution of Genetic Epistemology, the research was carried out in a public school in the city of Londrina, Paraná, with the participation of 12 students. The results indicate that the notions of music are linked to the understanding of the social reality constructed by the participants. For this reason, by considering such constructive processes, through which social reality can be constantly signified by students, we aim to create opportunities for musical-pedagogical actions that favor the expansion of the idea of music and its domains.

Ecological Values Theory: Beyond Conformity, Goal-Seeking, and Rule-Following in Action and Interaction

Values have long been considered important for psychology but are frequently characterized as beliefs, goals, rules, or norms. Ecological values theory locates them, not in people or in objects, but in ecosystem relationships and the demands those relationships place on fields of action within the system. To test the worth of this approach, we consider skilled coordination tasks in social psychology (e.g., negotiating disagreements, synchrony and asynchrony in interactions, and selectivity in social learning) and perception-action (e.g., driving vehicles and carrying a child). Evidence suggests that a diverse array of values (e.g., truth, social solidarity, justice, flexibility, safety, and comfort) work in a cooperative tension to guide actions. Values emerge as critical constraints on action that differ from goals, rules, and natural laws, and yet provide the larger context in which they can function effectively. Prospects and challenges for understanding values and their role in action, including theoretical and methodological issues, are considered.

Conformity on moral, social conventional and decency issues in the United Kingdom and Kuwait

Theories in moral psychology have debated whether people's moral judgements are influenced by social processes, such as others' opinions, arguments, and actions. This research investigated conformity with moral, social conventional and decency issues in adults from the United Kingdom (Study 1, N = 50) and Kuwait (Study 2, N = 164). Participants first had to make individual judgements regarding moral, social conventional and decency transgressions. Using a conformity paradigm with low social presence, 5-10 days afterwards participants were presented with the judgements of a more permissive majority. British participants conformed to the majority for decency, and to a lesser extent moral, transgressions. Kuwaiti participants conformed across domains. Furthermore, females in Kuwait conformed more than males. These findings are discussed with reference to the influence of cultural, moral and gender norms on conformity. Furthermore, we consider the contributions of these findings in light of theories of moral judgement and conformity.

Content counts: A trait and moral reasoning framework for children's selective social learning

We present evidence that evaluative information plays a major role in children's selective social learning. We demonstrate that social learning patterns differ as a function of whether children are exposed to positively or negatively valenced information (e.g., content; informant characteristics) and that these patterns can be understood in the context of children's schemas for social groups, morality, and trait understanding. We highlight that attention must be given to theoretical ties between social learning and children's trait judgments and moral reasoning to strengthen our understanding of selective trust and account for variations in children's sophistication when they judge potential sources of information. Finally, we suggest revisions to current theoretical frameworks and offer suggestions to move the field forward.