Should I do what majority wants or what I want?

For 4- to 7-year olds

This study will take place on a video call, live with a researcher! Clicking on the “Schedule a time to participate” button will send you to an online calendar where you can select a date and time that works for you.

During the Zoom meeting you will meet one of our researchers and they will tell you a story about students in a classroom who want to do certain activities. In this game, your participating child is the leader of the classroom and they get to decide what the rest of the students will do; however, the classroom is split! Participants need to decide whether they want to go with what the majority of the classroom wants to do, or what they (and other few students) want to do.

Previous research tells us that young children take into account majority groups and align with them promptly over minority groups. However, in this study, we are interested in whether this still stands when we give children a leadership position with the possibility to go against a majority group in order to choose their own interest. Would children prefer to do an activity that the majority wants to do, or an activity that the minority and themselves wants to do? Overall, this study will provide more insight into children’s complex decision making!

20-25 minutes

Online participation of this study will be compensated in the form of a $5 Tango gift card sent to your email within 2 weeks as long as they meet the eligibility criteria.

The Eligibility criteria are:
1) Child needs to be in the age range
2) Child needs to be visible
3) Only one gift card is given per child