Factors influencing young childrens use of motives

1. Factors influencing young
children’s use of motives
and outcomes as moral
criteria
Sharon A Nelson (1980)

2. Subjects
 60 pre-school children between the ages
of 3 to 4 years (mean 3.4)
 30 second-grade children between the
ages of 6 and 8 years (mean 7.4)
 Approx 50/50 male/female
 Mostly white, middle class, urban area
 Participated with parental consent

3. IV: Story presentation conditions
Verbal only
Verbal plus pictures, motive implied
Verbal plus pictures, motive made explicit

4. Story type
Good
motive
Good
outcome
Bad
outcome
Bad
motive
Good
outcome
Bad
outcome

5. Motive statements
 Good motive: This boy was playing with
a ball; his friend did not have anything to
play with. He wanted to throw the ball to
his friend so that they could play catch
together with the ball.
 Bad motive: This boy was playing with a
ball; he was mad at his friend that day.
He wanted to throw the ball at his friend
so that he could hit him on purpose.

6. Outcome statements
 Good outcome: The boy threw the ball.
His friend caught the ball and was happy
to play with it.
 Bad outcome: The boy threw the ball.
His friend did not catch the ball; the ball
hit his friend on the head and made him
cry.

7. Story example
 Good motive; bad outcome
 This boy was playing with a ball; his friend
did not have anything to play with. He
wanted to throw the ball to his friend so
that they could play catch together with
the ball. The boy threw the ball. His
friend did not catch the ball; the ball hit
his friend on the head and made him cry.

8. Pictures
 Two sets of black and white line drawings
were prepared.
 In one set, motive is shown only by facial
expression (implied motive) and in the
other set the motive is additionally
explained by a ‘thought bubble’ which
made the motive explicit.
 Each drawing 23 x 25 cm
 Showed motive, action, outcome

9. Pictures
 In the two conditions where pictures were
used in the story telling,the drawings would
be introduced one by one as the experimenter
told the story; laid side by side, and left on
the table for the child to refer to.
 In the “explicit” condition, a “thought bubble”
was added to make the motive clear.
(Bad) motive
made explicit
(Bad)
outcome –
boy cries

10. Response scale

11. Very good
(7)
Bad (2)
A little bit good
(5)
Very bad (1)
A little bit bad
(3)
Good (6)
Just OK (4)

12. Design
 Independent measures
 Children were randomly assigned to one of
three story-presentation conditions
(verbal only, verbal plus pictures
(implied); verbal plus pictures (explicit))
 20 children per group at the 3 year-old
level, and 10 children per group at the 7
year old level.
 Children in each groups heard all 4
versions of the story.

13. Procedure 1
 Children were interviewed individually by
the experimenter.
 Children were familiarised with each point
on the rating scale (7 point scale using
smiley faces of increasing /decreasing
size).
 Children in the picture-explicit group
given practice to familiarise themselves
with the cartoons used to illustrate
motive.

14. Procedure 2
 Children were told to listen very carefully
to the stories as later they would have to
re-tell them aloud themselves.
 After each story, the children were asked
whether the little boy in the story was a
good boy or a bad boy or ‘just OK’.
 They were asked how good or how bad by
pointing to one of the faces.

15. Procedure 3
 After their judgement, drawings were
removed and children were asked to tell
the story aloud exactly as they had heard
it.
 If motive or outcome information was
omitted, experimenter would ask specific
questions – “Why did the boy throw the
ball?” to elicit the information.

16. Results
 Mean rating of the main character in the
good motive conditions was 5.35, and
2.27 in the bad motive conditions.
 Mean rating of the main character in the
good outcome conditions 4.70 and in
the bad outcome conditions was 2.92

17. So . . .
Motive is a more decisive factor in
moral judgements than outcome
(p<0.001)

18. 3 year-old
Good outcome
Bad outcome
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
Good motive
Bad motive
6.65
2.27
4.17
1.6
Good outcome
Bad outcome

19. 7 year-old
Good outcome
Bad outcome
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
Good motive
Bad motive
6.2
3.46 Good outcome
Bad outcome

20. So . . .
Compared to 7-y/o children, 3-y/o
children judge the actor (the main
boy in the story) worse after one
negative cue (whether motive or
outcome)

21. Effect of style of presentation
Motive made little difference
Outcome had a greater effect on moral
judgements in the ‘explicit motive’
condition (p<0.01)
Outcome information was used more
(i.e. made more difference to
judgements) in ‘bad motive’ stories in
the two picture conditions than verbal
only (p<0.01)

22. Results of recall
 Inter-coder reliability 97%
 3-y/o children made more errors (0.41)
than 7-y/o (0.16)
 More recall errors in motive than outcome
 Fewer recall errors in picture
presentations

23.  The authors suggest that younger children will
assume that good motive = good outcome
(and vice versa).
 They call this congruence.
 If the younger children have to deal with
incongruent stories (eg good motive=bad
outcome) they tend to make more errors, as
they will change the story to help make it
make ‘sense’.
 This effect was not observed in the 7 year
olds.

24. Discussion 1
 Pre-school children give more emphasis to the
goodness – or especially the badness of the
cue, rather than its source – motive or
outcome.
 It has been suggested that young children
develop the concept of bad before the concept
of good.
 When they make a judgement, children may
pay attention to ‘bad’ information of any kind.
 Children may define good as the absence of
bad – so positive judgements will only be
made in the absence of negative information.

25. So . . .
“Thus it may be that the first
negative cue – motive or outcome –
encountered by the pre-schooler in
the story situation will be sufficient
to establish a negative outcome.”
 [p 827]

26. Study 2
 Is it possible that motive may have been
used as a basis for judgement simply
because it was always the first cue
encountered?
 In this second study, the outcome was
presented first, the motive second.

27. Subjects etc
 27 pre-schol boys and girls
 Mean age 3.8 years
 Same IV as previously
 Materials identical to first study
 Description of the outcome preceded
description of the motive.

28. Results
1. Good outcomes rated more positively
than bad outcomes (and good motives rated
more positively than bad motives).
2. If either cue is negative, then judgement
is biased to towards negative.
3. In verbal presentations it is the first
cue encountered.
4. Children make more errors when the
story is incongruent.

29. So . . .
 When stories are presented verbally,
information following a negative cue has
less impact than the first thing they hear.
 When stories are accompanied by
pictures, judgements are more likely to be
influenced by both good and bad motives
and outcomes.
 3 year olds make judgements that
consistently rely on one cue.

30. And finally . . . almost
 Motive is influential in its own right as a
source of relevant information for pre-
schoolers.
 Many children’s judgements reflected the
use of motive alone.
 The data from the children’s recall of the
stories strongly suggests they expect a
logical connection between motive and
outcome – they try to make the story
congruent.

31. Finally (really)
“The fact that these children sought
to justify their evaluations by the
actor’s motive as well as by the
outcome indicates an awareness
that the motivation for behaviour
should be considered.” [p 829]