Children's Conceptions of Lying: East-West Comparisons

儿童对说谎的看法：东西方比较

• 批准号: 7113141
• 负责人: Gail D Heyman
• 金额: $ 34.43万
• 依托单位: UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 财政年份: 2005
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2005-08-17 至 2010-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/7113141
• 关键词: American; Canada; China; Chinese; Chinese American; Japan; Japanese; Japanese American; United States; adolescence (12-20); behavioral /social science research tag; child behavior disorders; clinical research; culture; geographic difference; human subject; longitudinal human study; middle childhood (6-11); morals; social behavior disorders

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): An international team of researchers will collaborate to investigate how North American and Eastern Asian children acquire the concepts of lying and the associated moral values. In contrast to most studies that mainly involve Western children, our experimental strategy is to sample school-aged children from US, Canada, P.R. China, and Japan. This comparative approach allows us to identify cross-cultural similarities and differences in children's moral understanding of dishonesty, and to determine the extent to which such understanding is shaped by children's unique cultural experiences. We will test a basic hypothesis that because the North American and Eastern Asian cultures emphasize differentially individualism and collectivism, children's moral conception of honesty and dishonesty will be different in these cultures. Three experimental series will systematically examine whether North American and East Asian children categorize untruthful statements as lies and give positive or negative ratings to them when the statements are told (a) to be modest, (b) to be polite, or (c) to benefit another individual or a collective. A fourth experimental series will compare the moral conceptions of lying and truth-telling in East Asian children born and raised in North America, East Asian children raised in East Asia, and Non-East Asian children raised in North America. This comparison examines the relative influence of the macro (school) - and micro- (home) cultural environments on children's moral conceptions of lying. The theoretical significance of our project is to provide a cross-cultural perspective on current research regarding the development of truth- and lie-telling, to delineate cultural factors contributing to the formation of moral values in the domain of verbal communication, and ultimately to form an integrated, cross-cultural account of the development of honesty and dishonesty in children. Practically, knowledge about the normal development of children's moral conceptions of lying can provide mental health professionals with useful information for assessing and treating atypical children from different cultural backgrounds who have conduct disorders, of which dishonesty is one major symptom. Also, this research will offer educators much needed information regarding culturally sensitive strategies to teach children about honesty and lying. In the legal domain, our findings can assist legal practitioners in developing culturally sensitive procedures to assess child witnesses' competence and credibility in courts of law.

描述（由申请人提供）：一个国际研究小组将合作调查北美和东亚儿童如何获得说谎的概念以及相关的道德价值观。与大多数主要涉及西方儿童的研究不同，我们的实验策略是对来自美国、加拿大、中国和日本的学龄儿童进行抽样。这种比较方法使我们能够识别儿童对不诚实的道德理解的跨文化异同，并确定儿童独特的文化经历在多大程度上塑造了这种理解。我们将检验一个基本假设，即由于北美和东亚文化强调不同的个人主义和集体主义，因此这些文化中儿童对诚实和不诚实的道德观念会有所不同。三个实验系列将系统地检验北美和东亚儿童是否将不真实的陈述归类为谎言，并在这些陈述被告知（a）要谦虚，（b）要礼貌，或（c）有利于另一个人或集体时给予他们正面或负面的评价。第四个实验系列将比较在北美出生和长大的东亚儿童、在东亚长大的东亚儿童以及在北美长大的非东亚儿童的说谎和说真话的道德观念。这一比较考察了宏观（学校）和微观（家庭）文化环境对儿童说谎道德观念的相对影响。我们项目的理论意义在于，为当前关于说真话和说谎的发展的研究提供跨文化视角，描绘有助于言语交流领域道德价值观形成的文化因素，并最终对儿童诚实和不诚实的发展形成一个综合的、跨文化的解释。实际上，了解儿童说谎道德观念的正常发展可以为心理健康专业人员提供有用的信息，以评估和治疗来自不同文化背景的行为障碍（其中不诚实是其主要症状之一）的非典型儿童。此外，这项研究将为教育工作者提供急需的有关文化敏感策略的信息，以教导孩子诚实和谎言。在法律领域，我们的研究结果可以帮助法律从业者制定文化敏感的程序，以评估儿童证人在法庭上的能力和可信度。