Cognitive flexibility moderates the association between theory of mind and children’s offer in the Ultimatum Game ( La flexibilidad cognitiva modera la relación entre la teoría de la mente y las ofertas de los niños en el Juego del Ultimátum )
Restricted accessResearch articleFirst published online May, 2023
Cognitive flexibility moderates the association between theory of mind and children’s offer in the Ultimatum Game ( La flexibilidad cognitiva modera la relación entre la teoría de la mente y las ofertas de los niños en el Juego del Ultimátum )
This study examined the cognitive predictors and constraints of children’s strategic offers in the Ultimatum Game. The Ultimatum Game is a one-shot negotiation on the division of a given sum of rewards between two people, where the receiver has the right to punish the proposer by rejecting unfair offers, which results in nil reward for either party. Ninety-four Hong Kong children ranged between three and six years of age (48 girls, M = 4.94, SD = 0.90) participated in an Ultimatum Game, and tasks measuring theory of mind, cognitive flexibility, inhibitory control and verbal ability. Children’s theory of mind, measured with false belief understanding tasks, was positively associated with their Ultimatum Game offers. Regression analysis further demonstrated that cognitive flexibility moderated the association between false belief understanding and children’s offers in the Ultimatum Game. Being able to take the opponent’s perspective prompted children to offer more in the Ultimatum Game, but only when their cognitive flexibility was low.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
AllgaierK.ŚcigałaK. A.TrautweinU.HilbigB. E.ZettlerI. (2020). Honesty-humility and dictator and Ultimatum Game-giving in children. Journal of Research in Personality, 85, 103907. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jrp.2019.103907
2.
ArtingerF.ExadaktylosF.KoppelH.SääksvuoriL. (2014). In others’ shoes: Do individual differences in empathy and theory of mind shape social preferences?PLoS One, 9(4), e92844. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0092844
3.
BaumertA.SchlösserT.SchmittM. (2014). Economic games: A performance-based assessment of fairness and altruism. European Journal of Psychological Assessment, 30(3), 178–192. https://doi.org/10.1027/1015-5759/a000183
4.
BlakeP. R. (2018). Giving what one should: Explanations for the knowledge-behavior gap for altruistic giving. Current Opinion in Psychology, 20, 1–5. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.copsyc.2017.07.041
5.
BurkartJ. M.RuethK. (2013). Preschool children fail primate prosocial game because of attentional task demands. PLoS One, 8(7), e68440. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0068440
6.
CamererC. F. (2003). Behavioral game theory. Princeton University Press.
7.
ChenY.ZhuL.ChenZ. (2013). Family income affects children’s altruistic behavior in the Dictator Game. PLoS One, 8(11), e80419. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0080419
8.
DeákG. O.WiseheartM. (2015). Cognitive flexibility in young children: General or task-specific capacity?Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 138, 31–53. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jecp.2015.04.003
9.
DeboveS.BaumardN.AndréJ. B. (2016). Models of the evolution of fairness in the Ultimatum Game: A review and classification. Evolution and Human Behavior, 37(3), 245–254. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2016.01.001
FehrE.BernhardH.RockenbachB. (2008). Egalitarianism in young children. Nature, 454(7208), 1079–1083. https://doi.org/10.1038/nature07155
12.
FryeD.ZelazoP. D.PalfaiT. (1995). Theory of mind and rule-based reasoning. Cognitive Development, 10(4), 483–527. https://doi.org/10.1016/0885-2014(95)90024-1
13.
GerstadtC. L.HongY. J.DiamondA. (1994). The relationship between cognition and action: Performance of children 312–7 years old on a Stroop-like day-night test. Cognition, 53(2), 129–153. https://doi.org/10.1016/0010-0277(94)90068-X
14.
GignacG. E.SzodoraiE. T. (2016). Effect size guidelines for individual differences researchers. Personality and Individual Differences, 102, 74–78. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2016.06.069
15.
GopnikA.AstingtonJ. W. (1988). Children’s understanding of representational change and its relation to the understanding of false belief and the appearance-reality distinction. Child Development, 59(1), 26–37. https://doi.org/10.2307/1130386
16.
HairJ.BlackW. C.BabinB. J.AndersonR. E. (2010). Multivariate data analysis (7th ed.). Pearson Education International.
17.
HughesC.AdlamA.HappéF.JacksonJ.TaylorA.CaspiA. (2000). Good test—retest reliability for standard and advanced false-belief tasks across a wide range of abilities. The Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry and Allied Disciplines, 41(4), 483–490. https://doi.org/10.1111/1469-7610.00633
18.
ImutaK.HenryJ. D.SlaughterV.SelcukB.RuffmanT. (2016). Theory of mind and prosocial behavior in childhood: A meta-analytic review. Developmental Psychology, 52(8), 1192–1205. https://doi.org/10.1037/dev0000140
19.
LarneyA.RotellaA.BarclayP. (2019). Stake size effects in Ultimatum Game and dictator game offers: A meta-analysis. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 151, 61–72. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.obhdp.2019.01.002
20.
LemanP. J.KellerM.TakezawaM.GummerumM. (2009). Children’s and adolescents’ decisions about sharing money with others. Social Development, 18(3), 711–727. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9507.2008.00486.x
21.
LucasM. M.WagnerL.ChowC. (2008). Fair game: The intuitive economics of resource exchange in four-year olds. Journal of Social, Evolutionary, and Cultural Psychology, 2(3), 74–88. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0099353
22.
MahyC. E.BernsteinD. M.GerrardL. D.AtanceC. M. (2017). Testing the validity of a continuous false belief task in 3-to 7-year-old children. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 160, 50–66. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jecp.2017.03.010
23.
MontgomeryD. E.KoeltzowT. E. (2010). A review of the day–night task: The Stroop paradigm and interference control in young children. Developmental Review, 30(3), 308–330. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dr.2010.07.001
24.
OosterbeekH.SloofR.Van de KuilenG. (2004). Cultural differences in Ultimatum Game experiments: Evidence from a meta-analysis. Experimental Economics, 7(2), 171–188. https://doi.org/10.1023/B:EXEC.0000026978.14316.74
25.
PaulusM.LicataM.KristenS.ThoermerC.WoodwardA.SodianB. (2015). Social understanding and self-regulation predict pre-schoolers’ sharing with friends and disliked peers: A longitudinal study. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 39(1), 53–64. https://doi.org/10.1177/0165025414537923
26.
PérezB. L.PatelH.ZuffianòA. (2022). Theory of mind and children’s comforting behaviour. Journal for the Study of Education and Development, Infancia y Aprendizaje, 45(1), 116–139. https://doi.org/10.1080/02103702.2021.1952774
27.
RepacholiB.SlaughterV.PritchardM.GibbsV. (2003). Theory of mind, Machiavellianism, and social functioning in childhood. In RepacholiB.SlaughterV. (Eds.), Individual differences in theory of mind: Implications for typical and atypical development (pp. 67–97). Psychology Press.
28.
RochatP.DiasM. D. G.GuoL.BroeschT.Passos-FerreiraC.WinningA.BergB. (2009). Fairness in distributive justice by 3- and 5-year-olds across 7 cultures. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 40(3), 416–442. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022022109332844
29.
SallyD.HillE. L. (2006). The development of interpersonal strategy: Autism, theory of mind, cooperation and fairness. Journal of Economic Psychology, 27(1), 73–97. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.joep.2005.06.015
30.
SmithC. E.BlakeP. R.HarrisP. L. (2013). I should but I won’t: Why young children endorse norms of fair sharing but do not follow them. PLoS One, 8(3), e59510. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0059510
31.
SteinbeisN.BernhardtB. C.SingerT. (2012). Impulse control and underlying functions of the left DLPFC mediate age-related and age-independent individual differences in strategic social behavior. Neuron, 73(5), 1040–1051. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuron.2011.12.027
32.
TakagishiH.KameshimaS.SchugJ.KoizumiM.YamagishiT. (2010). Theory of mind enhances preference for fairness. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 105(1–2), 130–137. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jecp.2009.09.005
33.
TakagishiH.KoizumiM.FujiiT.SchugJ.KameshimaS.YamagishiT. (2014). The role of cognitive and emotional perspective taking in economic decision making in the Ultimatum Game. PLoS One, 9(9), e108462. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0108462
34.
WellmanH. M. (2014). Making minds: How theory of mind develops. Oxford University Press.
35.
WimmerH.PernerJ. (1983). Beliefs about beliefs: Representation and the containing function of wrong beliefs in young children’s understanding of deception. Cognition, 13(1), 103–128. https://doi.org/10.1016/0010-0277(83)90004-5
