Children see private correction as a cue to friendship

Children use a number of cues to infer friendship. For instance, children believe that people who are similar, spend time together, and are loyal to each other are friends (Liberman & Shaw, 2019). Here, in two studies (total N = 524), we investigated whether 4- to 12-year-old children infer friendship using a novel cue: managing someone’s reputation by correcting them in private. Children were asked whether an agent was better friends with a person they corrected in public, or one they corrected in private. Both younger (4- to 7-years-old) and older (8- to 12-years-old) children inferred stronger friendship between the agent and the privately corrected character (Study 1). In a second study, we asked whether an agent was better friends with a person they corrected in private, or a person who shared a different friendship cue (similarity, propinquity, loyalty). With age children became more likely to privilege private correction, and children who were attentive to the task expected private correction to be a stronger friendship cue than similarity (Study 2). These findings suggest that concerns for others’ reputations may play an important role in friendships, and protecting another person’s reputation may be increasingly indicative of friendship with development.