Schoolchildren cooperate more successfully with non-kin than with siblings

Gladys Barragan, Maxime Cauchoix (), Anne Regnier, Marie Bourjade (), Astrid Hopfensitz and Alexis Chaine ()
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Gladys Barragan: SETE - Station d'Ecologie Théorique et Expérimentale - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - FR AIB - Fédération de Recherche Agrobiosciences, Interactions et Biodiversité - UT3 - Université Toulouse III - Paul Sabatier - UT - Université de Toulouse - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, TSE-R - Toulouse School of Economics - UT Capitole - Université Toulouse Capitole - UT - Université de Toulouse - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - INRAE - Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement
Maxime Cauchoix: SETE - Station d'Ecologie Théorique et Expérimentale - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - FR AIB - Fédération de Recherche Agrobiosciences, Interactions et Biodiversité - UT3 - Université Toulouse III - Paul Sabatier - UT - Université de Toulouse - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
Anne Regnier: SETE - Station d'Ecologie Théorique et Expérimentale - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - FR AIB - Fédération de Recherche Agrobiosciences, Interactions et Biodiversité - UT3 - Université Toulouse III - Paul Sabatier - UT - Université de Toulouse - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
Marie Bourjade: CLLE - Cognition, langues, langage, ergonomie - EPHE - École Pratique des Hautes Études - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres - UT2J - Université Toulouse - Jean Jaurès - UT - Université de Toulouse - UBM - Université Bordeaux Montaigne - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - TMBI - Toulouse Mind & Brain Institut - UT2J - Université Toulouse - Jean Jaurès - UT - Université de Toulouse - UT3 - Université Toulouse III - Paul Sabatier - UT - Université de Toulouse
Alexis Chaine: SETE - Station d'Ecologie Théorique et Expérimentale - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - FR AIB - Fédération de Recherche Agrobiosciences, Interactions et Biodiversité - UT3 - Université Toulouse III - Paul Sabatier - UT - Université de Toulouse - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique

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Abstract: Cooperation plays a key role in the development of advanced societies and can be stabilized through shared genes (kinship) or reciprocation. In humans, cooperation among kin occurs more readily than cooperation among non-kin. In many organisms, cooperation can shift with age (e.g. helpers at the nest); however, little is known about developmental shifts between kin and non-kin cooperation in humans. Using a cooperative game, we show that 3- to 10-year-old French schoolchildren cooperated less successfully with siblings than with non-kin children, whether or not non-kin partners were friends. Furthermore, children with larger social networks cooperated better and the perception of friendship among non-friends improved after cooperating. These results contrast with the well-established preference for kin cooperation among adults and indicate that non-kin cooperation in humans might serve to forge and extend non-kin social relationships during middle childhood and create opportunities for future collaboration beyond kin. Our results suggest that the current view of cooperation in humans may only apply to adults and that future studies should focus on how and why cooperation with different classes of partners might change during development in humans across cultures as well as other long-lived organisms.

Keywords: Kinship; Human evolution; Evolution of cooperation; Kin selection; Child development (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021-02
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-evo
Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://hal.science/hal-03167067v1
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Published in Proceedings - Royal society. Biological sciences, 2021, 288 (1944), ⟨10.1098/rspb.2020.2951⟩

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:journl:hal-03167067

DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2020.2951

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