Respect or Fear: Investigating Infants Expectations of Social Learning from contrasting leadership styles.
Bachelor thesis
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https://hdl.handle.net/11250/3135076Utgivelsesdato
2024Metadata
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Sammendrag
This study investigates whether infants expect subordinates “the red characters in figures 1-4” to learnfrom leaders, and not from bullies who use force and intimidation. It examines infant ability todifferentiate between respect-based and fear-based social power, and how these representationsinfluence their learning expectations. 14 Japanese infants aged 20-24 months participated in a between-subjects design conducted in a controlled laboratory setting. Participants were randomly assigned toobserve animations depicting either a leader (respect-based power) or a bully (fear-based power). Theexperiment consisted of three phases, the Character Familiarization Phase, where infants wereintroduced to either a leader or a bully; the Label Familiarization Phase, where the main agent (Theyellow character in figures 1-3) labeled a novel object as "Toma"; and the Test Phase, where infantreactions were measured as subordinates used a different label to the novel object "Mappi", in theabsence of the main agent. Results revealed that in the leader condition, infants showed significantlylonger looking times when the subordinates used a label different from the one introduced by the leader(Mean = 54.09 seconds, SD = 11.13), compared to the Bully Condition where the looking times werenot significantly different when subordinates adhered to or deviated from the bully’s directives (Mean= 35.74 seconds, SD = 16.52). These findings indicate that infants had strong expectations forsubordinates to follow the respected leader example, suggesting a recognition of and preference forlearning from respect-based power. Conversely, the lack of significant differences in the bully conditionsuggests that infants do not expect learning to occur under fear-based power. The study providesevidence that infants anticipate learning behaviors more from figures who display respect-based power. This study investigates whether infants expect subordinates “the red characters in figures 1-4” to learnfrom leaders, and not from bullies who use force and intimidation. It examines infant ability todifferentiate between respect-based and fear-based social power, and how these representationsinfluence their learning expectations. 14 Japanese infants aged 20-24 months participated in a between-subjects design conducted in a controlled laboratory setting. Participants were randomly assigned toobserve animations depicting either a leader (respect-based power) or a bully (fear-based power). Theexperiment consisted of three phases, the Character Familiarization Phase, where infants wereintroduced to either a leader or a bully; the Label Familiarization Phase, where the main agent (Theyellow character in figures 1-3) labeled a novel object as "Toma"; and the Test Phase, where infantreactions were measured as subordinates used a different label to the novel object "Mappi", in theabsence of the main agent. Results revealed that in the leader condition, infants showed significantlylonger looking times when the subordinates used a label different from the one introduced by the leader(Mean = 54.09 seconds, SD = 11.13), compared to the Bully Condition where the looking times werenot significantly different when subordinates adhered to or deviated from the bully’s directives (Mean= 35.74 seconds, SD = 16.52). These findings indicate that infants had strong expectations forsubordinates to follow the respected leader example, suggesting a recognition of and preference forlearning from respect-based power. Conversely, the lack of significant differences in the bully conditionsuggests that infants do not expect learning to occur under fear-based power. The study providesevidence that infants anticipate learning behaviors more from figures who display respect-based power.