儿童的社会权力认知及其与社会行为的关系

有关成人社会权力认知的研究已有大量的成果及理论, 但儿童的社会权力认知近期才受到关注。社会权力认知是儿童社会认知的重要组成部分。社会权力经常体现在社会支配及社会地位上的差异。从很早开始, 儿童就能基于不同的线索来判断社会权力, 儿童基于这些线索的认知发展有进化上的适应意义。儿童对社会权力获得方式的认知会随年龄增长而发生变化, 年幼儿童更认可基于支配的社会权力获得方式, 而年长儿童更认可基于声望的社会权力获得方式。儿童的社会权力认知会影响选择性信任、资源分配及亲社会行为。未来研究需要考虑影响儿童社会权力认知发展的内部机制以及儿童社会权力对社会行为影响的过程机制, 并考虑文化因素和早期互动经验对儿童社会权力认知发展的影响。

Children’s understanding of social power and its relationship with social behavior

While there has been much research concerning how adults understand the social power, recently researchers have been increasingly interested in how children conceptualize social power. Social power understanding is an important aspect of children’s social cognition, which can be reflected on the level of social dominance and social status. From early on, children can use different cues to judge social power, and based on these cues their cognition of social power are adaptive in evolutionary fitness. Meanwhile, children’s understanding of social power develops across the whole childhood. While younger children are more likely to acknowledge the way to get social power with dominance, older children prefer the way to get social power basing on prestige. Children’s cognition of social power can influence their selective trust, resource allocation, and prosocial behavior. Future research should consider the underlying mechanism of children’s social power cognition, and examine the processing mechanism of the relationship between children’s social power cognition and their social behavior. Moreover, cultural factor and early social interactive experience should be concerned to contribute to children’s cognition of social power.