There has been extensive research on children's moral evaluation of lying in prosocial situations. Current knowledge regarding the concept of lying has been derived from studies showing that cultural differences exist, whereby non-Western children tend to rate lie telling more positively than Western children do. These findings suggest that there are different views about whether children should publicize their prosocial behaviors and that children have universal motives when they admit to engaging in prosocial behavior. A gender difference has also been found in relation to prosocial behavior. However, previous studies did not investigate in detail children's motives for admission or non-admission to prosocial behavior, and if there is a gender difference. Therefore, this study examined the diversity in and development of motives for admitting or not admitting to engaging in prosocial behavior, with the aim of clarifying these behaviors as a function of children's grade level in school, and how such motives differ with age and gender. Questionnaires from 1345 elementary and junior high school students in Japan were analyzed. Results showed that children's communication tendency with regard to prosocial behavior reports peaked in the fourth grade of elementary school and gradually decreased thereafter. From the third grade of elementary school onwards, children reported that they refrained from admitting prosocial behaviors. Younger children more likely cited honesty as a crucial motive for admitting to prosocial behaviors. Girls were more likely to endorse honesty as a motive than boys were. Moreover, among younger children, girls feared others' negative evaluation and wanted to comply with modesty norms when not admitting. Further research is needed to examine the developmental process for motives behind prosocial behaviors.
Pharmacology, Toxicology and Pharmaceutical Science
1
3%
Other
5
14%
Unknown
13
36%
Attention Score in Context
Attention Score in Context
This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 1. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 23 February 2016.
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#18,439,846
of 22,846,662 outputs
Outputs from Frontiers in Psychology
#22,211
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Outputs of similar age
#216,477
of 298,004 outputs
Outputs of similar age from Frontiers in Psychology
#434
of 520 outputs
Altmetric has tracked 22,846,662 research outputs across all sources so far. This one is in the 11th percentile – i.e., 11% of other outputs scored the same or lower than it.
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We're also able to compare this research output to 520 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one. This one is in the 6th percentile – i.e., 6% of its contemporaries scored the same or lower than it.
