Dear all, Please see the forwarded message below for a seminar which may be of interest to you in St Andrews next Wednesday (8th Feb) in the seminar room. Many thanks, Emily ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Stephen Reicher &lt;sdr(a)st-andrews.ac.uk&gt; Date: 1 February 2012 09:15 Subject: FW: Extra seminar from Malinda Carpenter To: psy-staff &lt;psy-staff(a)st-andrews.ac.uk&gt;uk>, Helen Sunderland < hes1(a)st-andrews.ac.uk&gt;gt;, psy-postg &lt;psy-postg(a)st-andrews.ac.uk&gt; Dear all, There is to be an extra seminar next Wednesday at 5pm from Malinda Carpenter of the Max Planck Institute in Leipzig (details below). The seminar is to be held in the Seminar Room, *not* the Old Library. Steve * * Social motivations in infants and young children: Affiliation, alignment, and prosocial behaviour Malinda Carpenter Department of Developmental and Comparative Psychology Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology Leipzig, Germany Humans may be unique among animals in our social motivations, for example in the extent to which we identify with and wish to align ourselves with our fellow group members. I show here that these social motivations are already present in infancy and early childhood. I present a series of studies on imitation, affiliation, and identification, which highlight young children’s connections with their social group and document their early preferential treatment of in- vs. out-group members. A theme running through many of these studies is the prevalence of * pro*social motivations in children as well, in particular their tendency to help others. Thus I also take some time to discuss helping in young children, for example showing how eager children are to help others in general, but at the same time how children’s tendency to help can be increased further, and how (appropriately) selective children are in whom they help. I conclude that strong social and prosocial motivations are seen already beginning in infancy. -- Emily. J. E. Messer PhD Student Scottish Primate Research Group Centre for Social Learning and Cognitive Evolution School of Psychology University of St Andrews St Marys Quad, South Street, St Andrews KY16 9JP +44 (0)1334 46 3043