We’ve all been kids, so odds are all of us have, at a while in our lives, cried, “It’s not truthful!” That indignant grievance (or pitiful, relying on the persona) comes when another person eats the final bowl of cereal, will get an even bigger piece of birthday cake, or will get later bedtime. We’re eager on issues of fairness.
Psychologists say kids have an innate sense of equity as do some animals. In experiments with monkeys, researchers discovered that when a monkey didn’t obtain the identical reward for sure behaviors as did one other monkey close by, it perceived the inequity and reacted negatively. They don’t seem to be taught this sense of equity. Neither are kids. It comes naturally.
Arlene Neal resides in Dudley Shoals and is a retired English chair from Catawba Valley Neighborhood Faculty. You could contact her at [email protected].