Children Aged 7–9 Consider Socio‐Economic Status and Waste Avoidance in Egalitarian Preferences: Experimental Evidence From Turkey

Past research has shown that socioeconomic status is one of the key factors influencing children's egalitarian decisions in third‐party resource distributions. However, it is not yet known whether the socioeconomic status of both the distributor and the recipient plays a role in egalitarian preferences. Additionally, studies have indicated that, in non‐Western cultural contexts, having to waste extra resources to ensure equality can act as a barrier to egalitarian preferences. Taken together, avoiding resource waste and considering socioeconomic status are significant determinants of egalitarian preferences for children. This study examined children's egalitarian preferences by considering the necessity of resource waste, the socio‐economic status of the recipient and the participants' own socio‐economic status. A total of 266 children from various districts in Istanbul (Turkey) participated. The children's socio‐economic status was determined based on the development level of their residential districts, categorizing them into low socio‐economic status ( N = 120) and high socio‐economic status ( N = 146) groups. The findings revealed that resource waste and the recipient's socio‐economic status played a significant role in shaping children's egalitarian preferences. When distributing resources to a wealthy recipient, children exhibited more egalitarian preferences if resource waste was unavoidable. However, these preferences did not vary when the recipient was poor. Unexpectedly, the children's own socio‐economic status had no significant effect on their egalitarian preferences. These results suggest that children prioritize the recipient's needs over their own socio‐economic status when making fair distributions, taking resource waste into account in this context. By addressing the impacts of both socio‐economic status and resource waste, this study may offer valuable insights into distributive justice preferences in a non‐Western cultural setting, specifically Turkey.