This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: Consistent enforcement of rules is more important than the severity of the punishment itself, and children expect adults to treat every member of their group impartially and equally. Moreover, fair punishment brings emotional relief to children, according to research by scientists from SWPS University and the University of Michigan.
Children are keen observers, and their sensitivity to social injustice is evident from an early age. Even preschoolers are able to recognize situations in which rules are being broken and expect antisocial behavior to be punished. As they get older, their sense of fairness becomes increasingly sophisticated: They not only expect violations to be punished but also understand that punishment should be proportional to the severity of a transgression.
In a study published in the Journal of Experimental Child Psychology (a follow-up to an earlier study by the same team, published in the journal Cognition), as part of an international project, scientists Katarzyna Myślińska-Szarek, Ph.D. (SWPS University), and Professor Felix Warneken (University of Michigan) focused on children's sense of fairness and their reactions to rule-breaking. Children from Poland and the United States, ages 6–9 (122 individuals), were shown picture stories in which characters engaged in rule-breaking behaviors, for example, used smartphones at school or left a mess after lunch. After watching a story, children answered a series of questions, such as whether the character should be punished and whether the punishment was fair.
The primacy effect, previously described in Cognition, is crucial in children's assessment of situations. The decision made by a guardian or teacher regarding the first child who broke a rule sets a standard for subsequent instances. This means that if the first offender is punished, their peers believe the second should suffer the same punishment.
If the first offender escapes consequences, children expect the second offender to be treated with the same leniency. Children are guided by so-called meta-norms, principles that dictate that rules must be applied impartially and equally to everyone. In a more recent study, researchers also investigated what happens when both characters in a story face the same consequence—either both are punished or both escape punishment.
They found that in this situation, almost all children (97%) believed the teacher did not need to change anything. However, when the consequences were different, as many as 93% of children demanded equal treatment. This shows that children focus not on punishment or its absence but on equal treatment.
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