I wouldn’t say unkind and cruel, self-absorbed is probably the better descriptor. They just haven’t developed the mental tools to understand how their actions affect the world yet
theory of mind develops continuously throughout childhood and into late adolescence as the synapses in the prefrontal cortex develop. The prefrontal cortex is thought to be involved in planning and decision-making. Children seem to develop theory of mind skills sequentially. The first skill to develop is the ability to recognize that others have diverse desires. Children are able to recognize that others have diverse beliefs soon after. The next skill to develop is recognizing that others have access to different knowledge bases. Finally, children are able to understand that others may have false beliefs and that others are capable of hiding emotions.
One of the most important milestones in theory of mind development is the ability to attribute false belief: in other words, to understand that other people can believe things which are not true. To do this, it is suggested, one must understand how knowledge is formed, that people’s beliefs are based on their knowledge, that mental states can differ from reality, and that people’s behavior can be predicted by their mental states. Numerous versions of false-belief task have been developed, based on the initial task created by Wimmer and Perner (1983).
In the most common version of the false-belief task (often called the Sally-Anne test), children are told a story about Sally and Anne. Sally has a marble, which she places into her basket, and then leaves the room. While she is out of the room, Anne takes the marble from the basket and puts it into the box. The child being tested is then asked where Sally will look for the marble once she returns. The child passes the task if she answers that Sally will look in the basket, where Sally put the marble; the child fails the task if she answers that Sally will look in the box. To pass the task, the child must be able to understand that another’s mental representation of the situation is different from their own, and the child must be able to predict behavior based on that understanding.
most typically developing children are able to pass the tasks from around age four.
Also, you wouldn’t call a cat playing with a mouse before killing it unkind and cruel, nor a wolfpack hunting a deer and slowly letting it bleed out. They are simply doing what comes naturally. Cruelty requires deliberate intent, it’s a social construct that isn’t fully applicable to children at early stages of mental development.
Sorry to write all this because you made a very good comment and I’m not trying to disagree with you, but calling young children unkind and cruel by nature just seems pessimistic and depressing to me.
It’s brilliant commentary on human nature and development.
Children are unkind and cruel by nature, and that underlies adult behavior, even with socialization.
I wouldn’t say unkind and cruel, self-absorbed is probably the better descriptor. They just haven’t developed the mental tools to understand how their actions affect the world yet
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_mind
relevant quotes
Also, you wouldn’t call a cat playing with a mouse before killing it unkind and cruel, nor a wolfpack hunting a deer and slowly letting it bleed out. They are simply doing what comes naturally. Cruelty requires deliberate intent, it’s a social construct that isn’t fully applicable to children at early stages of mental development.
Sorry to write all this because you made a very good comment and I’m not trying to disagree with you, but calling young children unkind and cruel by nature just seems pessimistic and depressing to me.