Thousands of human and animal subjects are being assessed in large replication studies. Getty/From L'R: top: Alastair Pollock; Volanthevist; Retales Botijero; Beata Whitehead. Middle: Anita Kot; Laura Mckenzie Waters; Sritanan; Jamie Grill. Bottom: Allen Chen; Henrik Sorensen; Emilija Manevska; StockImages_AT. Baby Zoe sits on her mother's lap and watches a puppet show featuring three shapes with googly eyes. A red circle struggles to climb a steep hill until a blue square helps it with a push. A yellow triangle blocks the way and shoves the red circle down the hill. When the show is over, Zoe is offered a choice of puppets. She doesn't hesitate: she ignores the unkind yellow triangle and makes a grab for the helpful blue square. The scene, from a Netflix documentary series released in 2020, recreates a highly cited 2007 study1, which found that babies as young as six months old overwhelmingly prefer characters who help, rather than hinder, others. On the basis of these findings,...
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