Psychological Science 1–8 © The Author(s) 2016 Reprints and permissions: sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.nav DOI: 10.1177/0956797616660548 pss.sagepub.com Research Article From distributing toys on the playground to raises in the office, children and adults respond negatively to inequity (Hook & Cook, 1979). According to traditional accounts of inequity aversion, people believe that it is inherently unfair to give unequal rewards for equal effort (Adams, 1965; Fehr & Schmidt, 1999); as children mature into adults, they gradually understand that inequity is unfair and therefore place increasing weight on avoiding it (Fehr, Bernhard, & Rockenbach, 2008). Prior results have been consistent with these accounts: Between the ages of 4 and 8, children increasingly sacrifice resources to avoid ineq- uity (Blake & McAuliffe, 2011; Kogut, 2012; Moore, 2009). We challenge these accounts by suggesting that reac- tions to inequity may take different developmental paths depending on the type of inequity and the way it is cre- ated. Once children have matured into adults, they do not seem to find inequity to be inherently unfair and instead find some types of inequity unacceptable and other types acceptable. For example, if Mark and Danielle are being given things by someone else, Mark will find it unfair if Danielle receives more than he does. However, when Mark is the one deciding how to allocate the resources between himself and Danielle (i.e., when Mark is agentic), he will think it is fair to receive less than Danielle (Choshen-Hillel, Shaw, & Caruso, 2015; Choshen- Hillel & Yaniv, 2011, 2012). The different reactions to these two forms of inequity are apparent in an episode of PBS’s Sesame Street (Myhrum, 1979) in which Ernie takes a big piece of pie for himself and gives a smaller piece to Bert. Bert responds, “That is not very polite. I mean, if I had two pieces of pie, I’d offer you the big piece and take the small one for myself.” Ernie confusedly replies, “Well . . . you have the small piece, Bert.” Ernie is missing the point; Bert is not upset about the inequity per se but is instead upset about what the inequity entails: unfairness. That is why he would willingly disadvantage himself but is upset when Ernie creates the same inequity. 660548PSS XX X 10.1177/0956797616660548Shaw et al.Development of Inequity Aversion research-article 2016 Corresponding Author: Alex Shaw, Department of Psychology, University of Chicago, 5848 University Ave., Chicago, IL 60637 E-mail: alex.w.shaw@gmail.com The Development of Inequity Aversion: Understanding When (and Why) People Give Others the Bigger Piece of the Pie Alex Shaw 1 , Shoham Choshen-Hillel 2 , and Eugene M. Caruso 3 1 Department of Psychology, University of Chicago; 2 The Jerusalem School of Business Administration, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem; and 3 Booth School of Business, University of Chicago Abstract Children and adults respond negatively to inequity. Traditional accounts of inequity aversion suggest that as children mature into adults, they become less likely to endorse all forms of inequity. We challenge the idea that children have a unified concern with inequity that simply becomes stronger with age. Instead, we argue that the developmental trajectory of inequity aversion depends on whether the inequity is seen as fair or unfair. In three studies (N = 501), 7- to 8-year-olds were more likely than 4- to 6-year-olds to create inequity that disadvantaged themselves—a fair type of inequity. In findings consistent with our theory, 7- to 8-year-olds were not more likely than 4- to 6-year-olds to endorse advantageous inequity (Study 1) or inequity created by third parties (Studies 2 and 3)—unfair types of inequity. We discuss how these results expand on recent accounts of children’s developing concerns with generosity and partiality. Keywords inequity aversion, generosity, partiality, fairness, social cognitive development, open data, open materials Received 11/24/15; Revision accepted 6/29/16 Psychological Science OnlineFirst, published on August 15, 2016 as doi:10.1177/0956797616660548 at UNIV OF CHICAGO LIBRARY on August 15, 2016 pss.sagepub.com Downloaded from