CogSci 2025

August 02, 2025

San Francisco, United States

Would you like to see your presentation here, made available to a global audience of researchers?
Add your own presentation or have us affordably record your next conference.

keywords:

social cognition

development

psychology

Is it more wrong to harm a plant than a rock? Little is known about the development of our moral consideration for plants—alive but not typically seen as having human-like minds. This study examined whether adults (N=153) and young children (pilot N=17) tend to value plants over non-living things. Participants watched a video of a plant restorer caring for a plant but knocking down a bucket and a plant harmer caring for a bucket but knocking down a plant. The proportion of adults who disliked or distrusted the plant harmer, and identified them as the bad guy—compared to the plant restorer—was significantly greater than chance (ps<.001). Additionally, participants judged harming the plant more severely than harming the bucket (p<.001). Although children judged harming the plant and bucket as similarly wrong, 65% of them liked the plant restorer more. After completing data collection, we will examine developmental differences.

Downloads

Paper

Next from CogSci 2025

INTUIT: Investigating intuitive reasoning in humans and language models
poster

INTUIT: Investigating intuitive reasoning in humans and language models

CogSci 2025

Jonathan Prunty and 2 other authors

02 August 2025

Stay up to date with the latest Underline news!

Select topic of interest (you can select more than one)

PRESENTATIONS

  • All Presentations
  • For Librarians
  • Resource Center
  • Free Trial
Underline Science, Inc.
1216 Broadway, 2nd Floor, New York, NY 10001, USA

© 2026 Underline - All rights reserved