ERIC Number: EJ1455467
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2025-Jan
Pages: 10
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0009-3920
EISSN: EISSN-1467-8624
Doing More than Expected: The Role of The Recipient's Neediness in Children's Perception of Their Relative Prosociality
Bar Levy-Friedman; Tehila Kogut
Child Development, v96 n1 p441-450 2025
This study examined children's self-assessment of their prosociality, relative to average peers, in situations where the recipient is described as "needy" versus "not needy" (at a school of average socioeconomic level in south Israel; N = 158; aged 6-12 years; 51% males, December-May 2021). The results show that older children exhibited the better-than-average (BTA) effect by seeing themselves as more generous than peers. In contrast, younger children displayed the worse-than-average effect by expecting peers to be more generous than themselves. However, both effects were attenuated ([partial eta-squared] = 0.16) when the recipient was described as "needy," leading to higher expectations of sharing from oneself and others. This implies that besides children's motivational tendency to self-evaluate as BTA, they also base their evaluations on actual environmental cues.
Descriptors: Foreign Countries, Elementary School Students, Student Attitudes, Prosocial Behavior, Self Concept, Age Differences, Altruism, Self Evaluation (Individuals), Sharing Behavior
Wiley. Available from: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030. Tel: 800-835-6770; e-mail: cs-journals@wiley.com; Web site: https://bibliotheek.ehb.be:2191/en-us
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Elementary Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: Israel
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A
Data File: URL: https://osf.io/j3hky/