Do Adults Judge Children Who Told Blunt Polite Truths More Negatively Than They Do liars
Despite the common lesson that it’s paramount to tell the truth, adults judged children who told blunt polite truths more negatively than they did liars in a recent study my colleague and I conducted.
We asked 171 adults to watch videos of children between the ages of 6 and 15. Participants got a bit of written background identifying which children were lying and which were telling the truth.
The lies were what psychologists call prosocial, meaning they benefited someone other than the child him- or herself. For instance, they might have been trying to protect a sibling who had destroyed their bike or to be polite and tell their parent they enjoyed the birthday party organized for them.
On the other hand, when they told the truth, the children were betraying a sibling to tell on them to t...







