Big Is Might – Size May Be Hardwired To Dominance, Study
Christopher Philip
Researchers led by Lotte Thomsen, Harvard University and University of Copenhagen have discovered evidence that very young children predict dominance outcomes based on body size.
To test this effect, infants where shown two “agents,” one small cartoon shape and one large cartoon shape interacting together along a shared path. The reactions of the infants were measured to see if they would expect the small or large object to yield to the movement of the other.
Specifically, they examined if the children would focus on the unexpected event in which two agents blocked each other’s path of motion and the bigger agent yields to the smaller one by bowing down and moving away, rather than vice versa.
Naturally, the researchers predicted that the infants would expect that the small object would heed to the large object, and permit it to move unobtrusively.
In the first condition, infants aged 11-16 months were shown two blocks of different sizes with drawn on eyes and mouth. At the outset, the blocks were depicted by themselves bouncing gently from one side to the other in the opposite direction. This was meant to demonstrate to the infants that the blocks ‘wished’ to move from one side to the other. Both blocks were then placed on the screen at the same time and moved toward one another into the center of the screen and then bumped into each other. Then they were shown backing up, and then approached again. This was repeated three times in total before they withdrew. This set the stage of conflict between the two agent’s goals.
Two trials then followed.
In one condition, the small agent bowed forward until it was lying down and then scooted sideways out of the way permitting the larger object to continue along its path toward the other end of the screen.
In the unexpected trial, the larger agent bowed to the smaller agent before permitting it to make its way to the other side.
The looking time was calculated in each condition and it was found, as expected, that the infants focus more on the unexpected trial where the large object bowed to the smaller object.
In a second experiment, infants 8, 9, 10 and 12-13 months old viewed the same sequence as described before only the researchers focused more on the first right of way passage to see if the infants would predict that the larger would bow to the smaller or vice versa.
The results were consistent with the first study showing that infants focused more on the trails where the large object bowed to the smaller object, rather than the reverse. The results confirm that the “big is mighty” prime develops sometime between 8-10 months of age.
Further testing revealed that indeed, infants were surprised when the larger agent bowed and scooted away from the smaller agent in a conflict, but not when it performed as expected.
Overall the experiments showed that infants use relative size to predict which agent has the right of way.
Interestingly, the 8-month-olds failed to see that big was might. However, the 9-month-olds marginally saw that big was might, whereas by age 10-13 month-olds the most common condition was for the infants to realize that the small should heed way to the large. This suggests that while infants are programmed to predict such outcomes, it is of a developmental origin.
The researchers note that while the infants are too young to have actively participated in dominance fights, it could be that they may have experienced older siblings taking their toys or observe older sibling struggling with each other and learned that relative size matters in such outcomes. However, this explanation, unlike the biological origins explaination, seems unlikely.
More probable is that, as the authors explain, while young infants have early developing mechanisms for learning about the physical world, it is also likely that they possess early-developing ideas tailored to understanding the social world.
Thus, it seems as if infants, as all people, are biologically programmed to understand that size matters in dominance.
Image Credit: Georgie Pauwels
Resources
Thomsen, Lotte; Willem E. Frankenhuis; McCaila Ingold-Smith and Susan Carey. Big and Mighty: Preverbal Infants Mentally Represent Social Dominance. Science. 2019. 331: 477. DOI: 10.1126/science.1199198