The boss is always right: Preschooler endorse the testimony of a dominant over that of a subordinate
Résumé
Recent research has shown that young children rely on social cues
to evaluate testimony. For instance, they prefer to endorse testi-
mony provided by a consensual group than by a single dissenter.
Given that dominance is pervasive in children’s social environ-
ment, it can be hypothesized that children also use dominance
relations in their selection of testimony. To test this hypothesis, a
dominance asymmetry was induced between two characters either
by having one repeatedly win in physical contests (physical power;
Experiment 1) or by having one repeatedly impose her goals on the
other (decisional power; Experiment 2). In two subsequent testi-
mony tasks, 3- to 5-year-old children significantly tended to
endorse the testimony of the dominant over that of the subordi-
nate. These results suggest that preschoolers take dominance into
account when evaluating testimony. In conclusion, we discuss
two potential explanations for these findings