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Development of Social Category Representations: Early Appreciation of Roles and Deontic Relations
Author(s) -
Kalish Charles W.,
Lawson Christopher A.
Publication year - 2008
Publication title -
child development
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.103
H-Index - 257
eISSN - 1467-8624
pISSN - 0009-3920
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-8624.2008.01144.x
Subject(s) - deontic logic , psychology , centrality , set (abstract data type) , cognition , developmental psychology , social psychology , cognitive psychology , linguistics , philosophy , mathematics , combinatorics , neuroscience , computer science , programming language
Three experiments explored the significance of deontic properties (involving rights and obligations) in representations of social categories. Preschool‐aged children ( M = 4.8), young school‐aged children ( M = 8.2), and adults judged the centrality of behavioral, psychological, and deontic properties for both familiar (Experiments 1 and 2, N s = 50 and 52, respectively) and novel (Experiment 3, N = 64) social categories. Preschool‐aged children were the most consistent in treating deontic properties as central: Knowing a person’s social category membership was more informative about obligations than about behavioral frequencies or psychological preferences. Adults treated deontic properties as central to some categories but also recognized a set that was primarily predictive of psychological dispositions. The results argue for the significance of deontic properties in the development of social cognition.