About this session

Saturday, 8:30 AM - 10:00 AM

Morality and harm in early childhood: Bridging typical and atypical development

Nearly all young children deal with harmful acts in their everyday life. Toddlers and preschoolers hit, bite, and kick others more often than older children and adults. Every society has moral prohibitions against harmful actions, and children who harm others, physically or relationally, risk many negative outcomes, from peer rejection to–ultimately–imprisonment. Yet every society also permits many acts of physical and relational harm, from teasing to self-defense. How young children develop views and decisions about when to harm others, and when to refrain, has both moral and clinical implications.

This symposium bridges research on externalizing behaviors and socio-moral development in the preschool years. To trace crucial transitions in children’s orientations toward harmful acts, four presentations examine predictors and underpinnings of aggressive and other harmful behaviors toward others.

The first talk presents evidence that theory of mind can explain gaps between preschoolers moral self-concept and their aggressive behavior. The second talk identifies moral-cognitive precursors of later aggressive and Machiavellian behaviors. The third talk reports on how negative emotional reactivity can moderate the effects of harsh parenting on callous-unemotional behaviors. Finally, the fourth talk presents findings from a novel video paradigm on how preschoolers distinguish good from bad acts of force in everyday life.

The discussion will highlight the benefits and challenges of bridging typical and atypical development, and it will identify questions for future research on the socio-moral contributors and consequences of children’s decisions about physical and relational harm.

Paper #1
Title	The Role of Theory of Mind in Preschoolers' Moral Self-Concept and Aggressive Behavior
Presenting author	Jamie Gahtan, University at Albany - SUNY, United States

Paper #2
Title	Early Childhood Correlates of Later Machiavellian and Aggressive Behavior
Presenting author	Marc M. Jambon, Wilfrid Laurier University, Canada

Paper #3
Title	Socializing forces in the development of callous-unemotional behaviors: Moderation by irritability and basal cortisol
Presenting author	Gretchen R. Perhamus, University at Buffalo, SUNY, United States

Paper #4
Title	How do children tell good from bad hitting? Studying children's moral distinctions with naturalistic videos
Presenting author	Zoe Favilla, Cornell University, United States

View all paper details

Session chair
Audun Dahl, Cornell University, United States

⇦ Back to schedule