The influence of friendship on children's fairness concerns in three societies

Abstract

Friendship is an important aspect of children's social lives. However, little is known about how it influences children's fairness behavior towards their peers. We tested (N = 183) pairs of children between 7 and 9 years of age from rural communities in India, Peru and Canada that are known to have divergent norms of fairness. Participants were paired with either a close friend or an acquaintance and could accept or reject different allocations of valuable resources. We experimentally compared children's responses to disadvantageous allocations (less for self) and advantageous allocations (more for self). Results showed that across the three societies children were more likely to reject disadvantageous allocations when they were paired with a friend relative to an acquaintance. When they stood to gain a relative advantage, children in Canada and to some extent Peru were more likely to reject advantageous allocations with friends, yet children in India rejected these offers rarely regardless of who they were paired with. These findings suggest that friendship may shape the expression of fairness concerns in young children, though its influence varies across societies.