lee

• background

  • limitations of previous research is that it is heavily ethnocentric
  • Chinese education promotes honesty and self effacement
  • western education promotes self aggrandisement
• aim - compare evaluations of truth telling and lie telling in prosocial and antisocial behavioural stories
• method

  • quasi - where the child is from cannot be manipulated
  • independent measures design
  • cross sectional
  • cross cultural
  • iv - whether heard social or physical story, pro or antisocial, age, culture
  • dv - rating given to the story characters deed and rating of characters speech
• sample

  • 120 Chinese
  • 108 canadian
  • 7,9,11 year olds
• procedure

  1. half in social, half in physical
  2. ps told what the meaning of the scale is
  3. ps read 4 scenarios, two pro and two antisocial stories
  4. the order of the stories was generated randomly
  5. ps asked about a post interview to gain some qualitative data
• results

  • as Chinese children age their perception of truth telling in prosocial situations decreases
  • as Chinese children age their perception of lie telling in prosocial situations increases
• conclusions

  • Chinese children are taught the value of honesty, through socialisation their morality develops
  • as a child ages the cultural importance increases and it becomes a larger part of their identity
• strengths

  • easy to replicate
  • controlled
  • quantitative and qualitative data gathered
• weaknesses

  • social desirability
  • reduced ecological validity
  • lacks mundane realism