Why are some children across cultures willing to harm the "others"

Harm towards outgroups is pervasive across societies throughout human history and can escalate into extreme violence. It is a long-standing challenge to understand the universal mechanisms of why people across populations seek to harm outgroup others, due to the complex and multifaceted nature of this issue, as well as limited data from non-WEIRD samples. There is growing evidence suggesting that harm is facilitated by a psychological mechanism known as dehumanization, the act of perceiving others as not fully human. However, what makes people dehumanize and how it comes about is unclear. The disattribution hypothesis proposes that dehumanization is linked to the ability to “disattribute” mental states to outgroup others, which consequently leads to outgroup harm. Alternatively, other researchers argue that perceived ingroup superiority and outgroup prejudice are the main predictors of outgroup harm (social dominance and prejudice hypothesis). Despite their early emergence, it is unclear whether and how different constructs of intergroup perception and preferences interact to explain harm in children. In this study, we uncover the common mechanisms underlying outgroup harm by testing the dissattribution hypothesis and the social dominance and prejudice hypothesis in school age children across three populations, China, the DRC and the US. We find that close to 40% of children chose to harm outgroup others by adding spice to spice-aversive outgroups. Further, we find support for the social dominance and prejudice hypothesis, but not the disattribution hypothesis, with perceived ingroup superiority being the key predictor of outgroup harm across populations, followed by outgroup prejudice. Our findings have broad implications on harm reduction interventions during development.