Children's judgments of psychological harm in normal and noncanonical situations

This study investigated children's (3-, 5-, and 7-year-olds) and adults' (t otal N = 92) integration of information about intentions, acts, and outcome s in moral judgments of psychological harm. Behavioral and emotional predic tions and judgments of act acceptability and punishment were made under nor mal and noncanonical causal conditions. Participants at all ages judged it wrong to inflict negative psychological reactions of fear or embarrassment on unwilling participants, even when these reactions were idiosyncratic or noncanonical. When assigning punishment, younger children tended to use an outcome rule, whereas older participants were more likely to use an intenti on rule or a conjunction rule (if outcome is negative and intention is nega tive, then punish). The results show that children as young as 3 years are able to take into account other people's idiosyncratic perspectives when ma king moral judgments of psychological harm.