According to new research, 6 month old babies can already assess someone’s intentions towards them, deciding who is a likely friend or enemy, even though they are barely able to sit up.
Like all social creatures, humans are able to make rapid judgements of other people based on how they behave towards others, but the roots of this behaviour and when it develops are not well understood. Scientists at Yale University devised experiments to test whether babies aged six and 10 months were able to evaluate the behaviour of others. The scientists writing in the journal Nature say that babies acquire the ability to make social evaluations in the first few months of life and that may provide the foundation for moral thoughts and actions in later years. While the scientists don’t think babies have any morality, the ability to feel positive about those who do good things and negative about those who do bad things is an important piece of a later more rational and moral system.
We believe this supports the rationale for the early development of emotional intelligence. Rather than focussing on academic skills and tests in pre-school and primary school, children should be exposed to nurturing environments in which games, music, art and team play are prioritised.
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