peer interaction and moral reasoning

Question 1

phylogenetic origin of human cooperation and morality (Tomasello and Vaish 2013)

Answer 1

studying great apes
differences to humans - less detailed communication
females do almost all childcare
humans are ultra-cooperative -something must have caused this - interdependence led to monopolising and created structures
threats from other groups strengthens group

Question 2

ontogenetic origin of human cooperation and morality (Tomasello and Vaish 2013)

Answer 2

• corruption when entering society as children
• humans are selfish and cooperative
• prosocial behaviours in young children: helping, sympathy, equality, sharing
• norm-based morality - enforced on children by adults and then they enforce it on each other e.g. tell on a peer in hopes that they get punished - enforces rules
• reputation, guilt, and shame - felt by toddlers from socialisation - show these emotions to get response from others
• humans aren’t unique in being prosocial and cooperative - other species too

Question 3

timeline of peer interactions from birth to 13+ (7)

Answer 3

infancy = interested in looking at and touching other infants, vocalize during interaction, cry when other infants cry
1-2 years = friendly and inquisitive interactions with other babies, watch each other play, pretend play, parallel moves to more co-ordinated play
3 years = co-ordinated play, role taking, preference for peers over adults
6 years = imaginative play, long play sequences
7 years = same gender preference, develops expectations of friends
11 years = deeper foundations to friendship - emotional support, not just playmate
13+ = cross gender relationships, development of conception of friendship

Question 4

cooperation in infants

Answer 4

species specific of humans
involves: have a joint goal, different but flexible roles, commitment to joint goal
age 1-2 = increasing cooperative activities and social games
children reengage partner when they stop playing - represents shared goal

Question 5

cooperation in chimps

Answer 5

Warneken et al

study whether chimpanzees also reengage others

perform one or other role in a joint task but don’t reengage the other if they stop → no evidence of shared goals

they try to solve the problem themself instead

Question 6

socialising role of peers

Answer 6

more in common than with family - preference for peers overtakes for adults at around 2-3 years old
influence behaviour – model behaviour which can be imitated, reinforce child’s behaviour (positively or negatively), set bench marks for child to compare self to –> self esteem

Question 7

Brofenbrenner - Ecological Systems Theory (1979)

Answer 7

microsystem = family and friends, close link so have a big effect - peer interactions provide learning opportunities that differ from those with caregivers
mesosystem = link between different microsystems
exosystem = media, community, school
macrosystem = culture, national customs, politics, economics, social

Question 8

peer acceptance

Answer 8

idea of being popular is important
effects: happiness, social development, school attendance, future behaviour, life outcomes
effect of acceptance can be mitigated by close friendships (e.g. not “popular” but can be content with one very close friendship)
peer status is stable over time - even in new groups

Question 9

study using sociometric techniques for peer acceptance and popularity

Answer 9

survey a school class - children view images of their class, selecting 3 they like a lot and 3 they don’t like
categorised children into:
popular = many good, few bad
controversial = equal good and bad
neglected = few of either
rejected = few good, many bad
* aggressive rejected = poor self-control, behavioural problems, disruptive
* nonaggressive rejected = anxious, withdrawn, socially unskilled

Question 10

factors for peer status (4)

Answer 10

• temperament/personality
• past experiences
• physical appearance: attractiveness, age, race, gender
• social skills: ability to process and act on social information

Question 11

social information processing (6 stages in a circle)

Answer 11

1. encode cues (own thoughts and other’s behaviours)
2. interpret cues
3. clarify goals
4. review possible actions
5. decide on action (review potential outcomes)
6. act on decision

using database of memory store, acquired rules, social schema, social knowledge for each of these stages/components

Question 12

assessing social information processing in relation to peer acceptance - study with 2x2 tasks

Answer 12

method:
3 different tasks:

1. watch videos of social interactions
   a. peer group entry
   b. peer provocation
   then asked questions about each stage in model (for both 1a and 1b)
2. peer task
   a. peer group entry = child had to join two children who were already playing together
   b. peer provocation = child provoked by a peer

measure ability on tasks
children also observed in classroom (naturalistic)

results:
ability on 1a predicted ability on task 2a
1b ability didn’t predict this

examples of different children:
average child

• 1a+b = good score
• 2a = ask other kids to play and asked them questions
• 2b = slight upset but not aggressive or blaming peers
• classroom = either solitary appropriate activity or positive peer interaction

rejected aggressive

• 1a+b = poor - didn’t use presented cues (s1), generated incompetent response (s4) and low enactment skills (s6)
• 2a = hovered, disconnected, incoherent verbalisations, changed physical orientation a lot
• 2b = retaliates, shouts
• classroom = spends half the time in solitary appropriate activity and a more than normal in antisocial interaction

Question 13

how children avoid/overcome rejection (3)

Answer 13

• desire to interact with others
• confidence in having something to contribute to the group
• interest in learning what others are like → their interests and opinions

Question 14

parents promotion of peer acceptance (6)

Answer 14

• first partners who child learns to interact with
• create opportunities children to interact with others
• role model in social interactions
• talking about social interactions → develops child’s understanding e.g. of social skills
• explicitly providing suggestions as to how to behave or advice on a way forward in a specific situation
• build up children’s confidence about their own likeability

Question 15

teachers promotion of peer acceptance (coaching study)

Answer 15

adults can coach children to be more accepted through 3 methods of communication:
1. asking peers positively toned questions
2. offer useful suggestions and directions to peers
3. make supportive statements to peers

children trained to rehearse these techniques and then took part in post-play self-evaluation
improved on socioeconomic measures compared to controls

Question 16

friend’s protection from peer acceptance

Answer 16

• popularity in peer group and dyadic or triadic friendships
• children can be unpopular but have a friend and are content with that friendship
• this relationship is protective against low peer group acceptance (Dunn 2004)
• others can find themselves bullied by supposed friend

Question 17

turiel vs haidts views on morality

Answer 17

turiel
moral judgement = judgements of justice, rights, and welfare on how people ought to relate to eachother

haidt
values, norms. practices, identities, institutions that work together to suppress selfishness and make social life possible
* defines in terms of its function
* many values make this up - not just one principle
* no one right moral code - viable alternatives

Question 18

morality and emotions

Answer 18

emotions are a biological adaptation
reactions to moral situations help us regulate life as a social species - with culture added in

Question 19

moral dilemmas example

Answer 19

trolley dilemma and footbridge dilemma
difference between pulling the lever and pushing someone off a bridge - same stakes but different results - possibly due to emotion

link between emotion and moral reasoning has been shown by MRI

Question 20

moral emotions, reasoning, and prosocial behaviours (4)

Answer 20

empathy = feeling as the other does
sympathy = feeling for the other
emotion contagion = tendency to catch other people’s emotions (babies cry hearing others cry, pupillary contagion in adults)
mimicry = tendency to automatically synchronise affective expressions, vocalisations, postures, and movements with those of another person -> feel corresponding affective expression from mimicking

Question 21

mimicking in babies

Answer 21

meltzoff (2004)
made expressions at babies and watched them imitate him - from very young age
“like-me” hypothesis - copying helps interpret behaviour they see from birth

Question 22

development of concern for others (study)

Answer 22

Zahn-Waxler et al (1992)
method
* longitudinal of babies age 1-2
* mother record responses to emotions over a year
* stimulate emotions once a week and recorded the reaction

results
* transition from being upset themself seeing someone in distress to attempting to comfort by engaging in prosocial behaviours
* 15 months = >50% respond to distress prosocially
* 25 months = all but one child did this
* expansion of repertoire of comforting behaviours over time

Question 23

sympathy via affective perspective taking

Answer 23

understanding how others are feeling without visible emotions
through inferring and imagination

Question 24

affective perspective taking study

Answer 24

Vaish et al (2009)
method
18 and 25 m/o played with experimenter 1 and 2
E1 was engaged in task (drawing) - with neutral expression
E2 either:
harm = tore up E1s picture
control = tore up blank paper
measured number and latency of concerned looks
then E1 has a balloon and drops it and says “oh no”
measured number of children who comforted or helped E1

results
more likely to look at E1 in harm condition, look quicker and for longer
more likely to help with balloon

conclusion
18 m/o can show concern for stranger in a hurtful situation who shows no emotion

Question 25

Piaget moral reasoning stages of development (3)

Answer 25

premoral = 0-5 = no understanding of moral rules
moral realism = 5-10 = rules come from higher authorities, actions are evaluated by their outcomes
moral subjectivism = 10+ = rules can be changed by mutual consent, intentions are important

Question 26

Kohlberg moral reasoning stages of development (3)

Answer 26

1. Preconventional (0-9yrs): What’s right is what authority figures say is right
2. Conventional (9-adulthood): What’s right is about what is generally accepted by people as right
3. Postconventional (some adults): There are universal moral principles that can transcend the law/majority view — lots of adults wont reach this stage

Question 27

limitations of Kohlberg’s moral reasoning stages of development

Answer 27

• gender bias - only tested males
• culture bias - western
• validity of clinical method of interview
• can only move upwards from one stage to the next, cannot be in 2 stages simultaneously
• doesn’t acknowledge children appreciate distinction between social conventions from moral ones early on (Turiel)

Question 28

Tomasello and Vaish stages of moral development:
* second-personal morality
* agent-neutral morality

Answer 28

second-person = moral decision revolve around specific others

agent-neutral = moral decisions involve following and enforcing group-wide social norms
culture influences the expression of this - e.g. collectivist cultures defer to majority more than individualist

Question 29

Tomasello and Vaish: development of moral reasoning - two types of intentionality

Answer 29

evo-devo approach (evolutionary and developmental)
driven by social interaction

joint then collective intentionality:

joint intentionality = two agents having a joint goal, understand this goal as shared, engage in joint attention to coordinate with each other while each knowing their own role

collective intentionality = moving things to the group level and taking a more objective, normative, perspective on how things are done – and should be done - in general in one’s culture

Question 30

role of peers in moral reasoning

Answer 30

developmental and evolutionary origins are social
reasoning skills developed to persuade others in argument - not for improving knowledge or decision making
often do this first with peers as a social equal
Piaget = this is context for early moral reasoning

Question 31

facilitating moral reasoning - piaget view and Kruger study

Answer 31

Piaget = interactions with peers is of critical importance for the development of moral reasoning

Kruger (1992)
method:

• 7-10-year-old girls’ moral reasoning using dilemmas - decide how to divide up the rewards of a task
• discuss situations with either a peer or with their mother (two conditions), reaching a consensus
• children were post-tested for moral reasoning

results:

• peer condition showed greater gains in moral reasoning at post-test
• reflective discourse (with peer or mother) correlated positively with moral reasoning at post-test