Preschoolers Selectively Trust and Selectively Share Based on the Mental States of Others

Discerning the pro- or antisocial traits of social partners is a complex, yet essential skill. When choosing social partners, children must understand that people may have laudable qualities in one domain but lack them in another. For example, a friend may have the best intentions for helping us with a task, but lack the necessary knowledge to assist. Research suggests children trust accurate over inaccurate sources and honest over deceptive sources (Mills, 2013). Further, children share more resources with characters that have been prosocial, rather than antisocial (Kenward & Dahl, 2011). However, it is unclear whether children are able to reason about both factors—reliability and prosociality—within the same social partners. This study addressed this question by investigating 168 three-, four- and five-year-olds’ selective trust and sharing behaviors in response to sources that differed in mental states (knowledge and intentions). Results indicated that children trusted those whose advice led to positive outcomes (regardless of their intentions). In contrast, children shared with the sources who had positive intentions and with sources who had negative intentions (but only when the latter sources gave accurate advice). These findings suggest that children can integrate relevant information to make advantageous social judgments, specifically—information about accuracy to reason about trust and prosociality to reason about sharing. Despite exhibiting antisocial characteristics, children also reason that social partners deserve rewards when they have positive qualities in other social domains.