Even Babies May Be Good Judges of Character:
In a study that suggests that people may begin evaluating one another for trustworthiness even earlier than believed, researchers showed infants a demonstration in which different shapes played the good guy or the bad guy. Then the infants were allowed to choose one to play with.The good guy won almost every time.
In the case of Circle, a small wooden character with big eyes, that would be Triangle, who helped him when he was struggling up the hill — not Square, who gave him a good shove back down.
Of course, when the roles were reversed and Triangle was cast as the hinderer, as the researchers called him, the infants preferred Square. (The shapes were moved by a researcher out of the sight of the infants.)
After repeated demonstrations, the infants, 6 and 10 months old, were presented with the helper and the hinderer. They almost always reached for the helper. The study appears in the November 22 issue of Nature; the lead author is J. Kiley Hamlin of Yale.