Michael, John and Székely, Marcell (2017) Goal slippage : a mechanism for spontaneous instrumental helping in infancy? Topoi . doi:10.1007/s11245-017-9485-5

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Abstract

In recent years, developmental psychologists have increasingly been interested in various forms of prosocial behavior observed in infants and young children—in particular comforting, sharing, pointing to provide information, and spontaneous instrumental helping. We briefly review several models that have been proposed to explain the psychological mechanisms underpinning these behaviors. Focusing on spontaneous instrumental helping, we home in on models based upon what Paulus (Child Development Perspectives 8(2):77–81, 2014) has dubbed ‘goal-alignment’, i.e. the idea that the identification of an agent’s goal leads infants to take up that goal as their own. We identify a problem with the most well-known model based upon this idea, namely the ‘goal contagion’ model. The problem arises from the way in which the model specifies the content of the goal which is identified and taken up. We then propose an alternative way of specifying the content of the goal, and use this as a starting point for articulating an alternative model based upon the idea of alignment, namely the ‘goal slippage’ model. By elucidating the difference between goal contagion and goal slippage, we contribute to the articulation of experimental criteria for assessing whether and when the mechanisms specified by these two models are at work.

Item Type:	Journal Article
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HM Sociology
Divisions:	Faculty of Social Sciences > Philosophy
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH):	Helping behavior, Social psychology, Goal (Psychology), Altruism
Journal or Publication Title:	Topoi
Publisher:	Springer Netherlands
ISSN:	0167-7411
Official Date:	21 April 2017
Dates:	Date Event 21 April 2017 Available 28 March 2017 Accepted
DOI:	10.1007/s11245-017-9485-5
Status:	Peer Reviewed
Publication Status:	Published
Access rights to Published version:	Open Access
Funder:	European Research Council (ERC)

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