Children who tell it like it is are judged more severely by adults than their soft-spoken counterparts, according to research.
A new study released on Wednesday has suggested little ones who tell blunt truths - such as "I don't like that" are more negatively looked upon by grown-ups than those who bend the truth to protect others.
Their findings, published in the Journal of Moral Education, showed that adults negatively perceived blunt truth-tellers more harshly than those who lied or told vague truth, but only when they told lies to be polite. The results further demonstrates the "mixed messages" that parents are sending their children about fibbing versus being honest in different contexts.
“This research tends to show there exists a complicated relationship with the truth that children must navigate to learn what is socially acceptable,” explained lead author Dr Laure Brimbal from the School of Criminal Justice & Criminology, at Texas State University.
“Most parents will have been embarrassed or upset by their children’s brutal honesty at some point. Learning to tell lies is a normal part of children’s social development.”
To reach their conclusion, researchers examined 267 adults, from Northeast US, showing them videos of 24 children, aged 6 to 15, telling the truth or lying in various social situations. In some scenarios, the kids lied to protect others - such as a girl not telling their parents about where their sister, who was in trouble was hiding.
Children also told "white lies" to avoid hurting a person's feelings. In total, they acted out four variations of ‘blunt’ or ‘subtle’ lies or truths. After watching each video, the adults rated their impression of the child’s character, including their trustworthiness, kindness, reliability, competence, likeability, intelligence and honesty.
Overall, the adult participants said they would most reward the children for telling ‘subtle truths’ - where kids vaguely admit truths without fully confirming the facts.
Dr Brimbal added: “Children are taught that lying is wrong, nevertheless they develop the ability to tell lies from an early age. To date, we know little about the mechanisms and processes that underlie the development and shaping of the critical social skill of prosocial lying, despite conflicting messages from adults about the acceptability of lying as opposed to truth-telling.
“What our results reveal is that children are learning about honesty in a quite complicated environment. It appears to be an important social skill to lie to fit in with other’s expectations, but this is in despite of potential conflicting messages from their adult caregivers that it is wrong to lie… whilst in addition, it is sometimes is perceived as unkind to be honest.
“Given the pervasive impact of socialisation influences on children’s behaviour, as well as the mixed messages children receive about lie-telling, it is little wonder that they engage in nuanced lie-telling from an early age."
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