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Altruism and strategic giving in children and adolescents

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  • Brocas, Isabelle
  • Carrillo, Juan
  • Kodaverdian, Niree

Abstract

We conduct a laboratory experiment to investigate the evolution of altruism and strategic giving from childhood to adulthood. 334 school-age children and adolescents (from K to 12th grade) and 48 college students participated in a one-shot dictator game and a repeated alternating version of the same dictator game. Each dictator game featured the choice between a fair split (4; 4) and a sel sh split (6; 1) between oneself and an anonymous partner. We nd that altruism (fair split in the one-shot game) increases with age in children and drops after adolescence, and cannot alone account for the development of cooperation in the repeated game. Older subjects reciprocate more and also better anticipate the potential gains of initiating a cooperative play. Overall, children younger than 7 years of age are neither altruistic nor strategic while college students strategically cooperate despite a relatively low level of altruism. Participants in the intermediate age range gradually learn to anticipate the long term bene ts of cooperation and to adapt their behavior to that of their partner. A turning point after which cooperation can be sustained occurs at about 11-12 years of age.

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  • Brocas, Isabelle & Carrillo, Juan & Kodaverdian, Niree, 2017. "Altruism and strategic giving in children and adolescents," CEPR Discussion Papers 12288, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    • Handle: RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:12288
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    Cited by:

    1. Brocas, Isabelle & Carrillo, Juan D. & Combs, T. Dalton & Kodaverdian, Niree, 2019. "The development of consistent decision-making across economic domains," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 116(C), pages 217-240.
    2. Zhou, Yexin & Chen, Siwei & Chen, Yefeng & Vollan, Björn, 2022. "Does parental migration impede the development of the cooperative preferences in their left-behind children? Evidence from a large-scale field experiment in China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 74(C).
    3. Zvonimir Bašić & Parampreet C. Bindra & Daniela Glätzle-Rützler & Angelo Romano & Matthias Sutter & Claudia Zoller, 2021. "The Roots of Cooperation," ECONtribute Discussion Papers Series 097, University of Bonn and University of Cologne, Germany.
    4. John, Katrin & Thomsen, Stephan L., 2017. "Gender Differences in the Development of Other-Regarding Preferences," IZA Discussion Papers 11044, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    5. Brocas, Isabelle & Carrillo, Juan D., 2020. "Introduction to special issue “Understanding Cognition and Decision Making by Children.” Studying decision-making in children: Challenges and opportunities," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 179(C), pages 777-783.
    6. Bašić, Zvonimir & Falk, Armin & Kosse, Fabian, 2020. "The development of egalitarian norm enforcement in childhood and adolescence," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 179(C), pages 667-680.
    7. Sutter, Matthias & Zoller, Claudia & Glätzle-Rützler, Daniela, 2019. "Economic behavior of children and adolescents – A first survey of experimental economics results," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 111(C), pages 98-121.
    8. Horn, Dániel & Kiss, Hubert János & Lénárd, Tünde, 2022. "Gender differences in preferences of adolescents: Evidence from a large-scale classroom experiment," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 194(C), pages 478-522.
    9. Brocas, Isabelle & Carrillo, Juan D., 2020. "Iterative dominance in young children: Experimental evidence in simple two-person games," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 179(C), pages 623-637.
    10. Bindra, Parampreet Christopher & Glätzle-Rützler, Daniela & Lergetporer, Philipp, 2020. "Discrimination at young age: Experimental evidence from preschool children," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 175(C), pages 55-70.
    11. Bonan, Jacopo & Burlacu, Sergiu & Galliera, Arianna, 2023. "Prosociality in variants of the dictator game: Evidence from children in El Salvador," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 107(C).
    12. Barash, Jori & Brocas, Isabelle & Carrillo, Juan D. & Kodaverdian, Niree, 2019. "Heuristic to Bayesian: The evolution of reasoning from childhood to adulthood," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 159(C), pages 305-322.
    13. Cadsby, C. Bram & Song, Fei & Yang, Xiaolan, 2020. "Are “left-behind” children really left behind? A lab-in-field experiment concerning the impact of rural/urban status and parental migration on children's other-regarding preferences," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 179(C), pages 715-728.
    14. Caserta, Maurizio & Distefano, Rosaria & Ferrante, Livio & Reito, Francesco, 2023. "The Good of Rules: A pilot study on prosocial behavior," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 107(C).

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    Keywords

    Developmental decision-making; altruism; Strategic giving; Repeated games;
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