We propose that human social cognition is structured around a basic understanding of
ourselves and others as intuitive utility maximizers: from a young age, humans implicitly …

Traditionally, ritual has been studied from broad sociocultural perspectives, with little
consideration of the psychological processes at play. Recently, however, psychologists have …

Winner of the Eleanor Maccoby Book Award in Developmental Psychology, American
Psychological Association Winner of a PROSE Award, Association of American Publishers …

Cognitive Development and Cognitive Neuroscience: The Learning Brain is a thoroughly
revised edition of the bestselling Cognitive Development. The new edition of this full-colour …

The world contains not only objects and features (red apples, glass bowls, wooden tables),
but also relations holding between them (apples contained in bowls, bowls supported by …

Given the overwhelming quantity of information available from the environment, how do
young learners know what to learn about and what to ignore? We found that 11-month-old …

The development and maintenance of prosocial, other-oriented behaviors has been of
considerable recent interest. Though it is clear that prosocial behaviors emerge early and …

From an evolutionary perspective, morality is a form of cooperation. Cooperation requires
individuals either to suppress their own self-interest or to equate it with that of others. We …

Both normative theories of ethics in philosophy and contemporary models of moral judgment
in psychology have focused almost exclusively on the permissibility of acts, in particular …

Narrative identity is a person's internalized and evolving life story, integrating the
reconstructed past and imagined future to provide life with some degree of unity and …