TY - JOUR
T1 - Ontogeny of prosocial behavior across diverse societies
AU - House, Bailey R.
AU - Silk, Joan B.
AU - Henrich, Joseph
AU - Barrett, H. Clark
AU - Scelza, Brooke A.
AU - Boyette, Adam H.
AU - Hewlett, Barry S.
AU - McElreath, Richard
AU - Laurence, Stephen
PY - 2013/9/3
Y1 - 2013/9/3
N2 - Humans are an exceptionally cooperative species, but there is substantial variation in the extent of cooperation across societies. Understanding the sources of this variability may provide insights about the forces that sustain cooperation. We examined the ontogeny of prosocial behavior by studying 326 children 3-14 y of age and 120 adults from six societies (age distributions varied across societies). These six societies span a wide range of extant human variation in culture, geography, and subsistence strategies, including foragers, herders, horticulturalists, and urban dwellers across the Americas, Oceania, and Africa. When delivering benefits to others was personally costly, rates of prosocial behavior dropped across all six societies as children approached middle childhood and then rates of prosociality diverged as children tracked toward the behavior of adults in their own societies. When prosocial acts did not require personal sacrifice, prosocial responses increased steadily as children matured with little variation in behavior across societies. Our results are consistent with theories emphasizing the importance of acquired cultural norms in shaping costly forms of cooperation and creating cross-cultural diversity.
AB - Humans are an exceptionally cooperative species, but there is substantial variation in the extent of cooperation across societies. Understanding the sources of this variability may provide insights about the forces that sustain cooperation. We examined the ontogeny of prosocial behavior by studying 326 children 3-14 y of age and 120 adults from six societies (age distributions varied across societies). These six societies span a wide range of extant human variation in culture, geography, and subsistence strategies, including foragers, herders, horticulturalists, and urban dwellers across the Americas, Oceania, and Africa. When delivering benefits to others was personally costly, rates of prosocial behavior dropped across all six societies as children approached middle childhood and then rates of prosociality diverged as children tracked toward the behavior of adults in their own societies. When prosocial acts did not require personal sacrifice, prosocial responses increased steadily as children matured with little variation in behavior across societies. Our results are consistent with theories emphasizing the importance of acquired cultural norms in shaping costly forms of cooperation and creating cross-cultural diversity.
KW - Development
KW - Gene-culture coevolution
KW - Population differences
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84883311391&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1073/pnas.1221217110
DO - 10.1073/pnas.1221217110
M3 - Article
C2 - 23959869
AN - SCOPUS:84883311391
SN - 0027-8424
VL - 110
SP - 14586
EP - 14591
JO - Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
JF - Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
IS - 36
ER -