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Updated: May 25, 2026
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Measuring Attentional Biases for Threat in Children and Adults
Published on: October 19, 2014
Children show heightened memory for threatening social actions.
Nicole C Baltazar1, Kristin Shutts, Katherine D Kinzler
1Department of Psychology, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL 60622, USA.
Journal of Experimental Child Psychology
|January 31, 2012
Summary
Preschool children remember mean actions better than nice ones. This negativity bias in memory may help them anticipate future threats.
Area of Science:
- Developmental Psychology
- Social Cognition
- Child Memory
Background:
- Social perception involves evaluating others' actions.
- A negativity bias, favoring negative information, is observed in adults.
- Limited research exists on this bias in young children's social memory.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate if preschoolers exhibit a negativity bias in memory for social actions.
- To determine if memory for perpetrators or recipients influences this bias.
Main Methods:
- Three experiments exposed children to social scenarios involving nice and mean actions.
- Memory recall for individuals and action details was assessed.
- Vignette perspectives (perpetrator vs. recipient) were manipulated.
Main Results:
- Children recalled 'who was mean' more accurately than 'who was nice'.
- A memory advantage for details of mean actions over nice actions was found.
- This bias persisted regardless of the vignette's perspective.
Conclusions:
- Preschoolers demonstrate a negativity bias in memory for social actions.
- This heightened memory for negative social events may aid in threat detection.
- Findings suggest early development of memory biases for social information.
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