Figuring out fairness
Most parents like to believe that their children are more intelligent and insightful than the average person realizes. When it comes to concepts of fairness, they might be right, according to Harvard researchers. A new study, conducted by Patricia Kanngiesser, a visiting graduate student from the University of Bristol, U.K., together with Felix Warneken, an assistant professor of psychology at Harvard, suggests that children may have a far more advanced concept of fairness than previously thought. The study, described in a paper recently published in PLoS ONE, shows that children as young as 3 consider merit — a key part of more-advanced ideas of fairness — when distributing resources. Earlier studies had suggested that the use of merit didn’t emerge until years later, when children approach school age. “What this finding demonstrates, I think, is that merit seems to be an essential part of the earliest forms of fairness that children display,”...