Children's recognition of pride

The purpose of this experiment was to examine when children identify their own experience as one of pride after they complete a difficult and competitive task (i.e., race a confederate in building a tower of blocks). A sample of 144 children between 3 and 6 years of age participated in one of three conditions. Children were told to try to build a tower of blocks taller than a confederate's tower (exceed standard) or tried and failed to build a tower of blocks taller than the confederate's tower (fail standard), or children were asked to build a tower of blocks alongside a confederate (no standard). Results revealed a developmental progression of recognizing pride in which children first began showing nonverbal behaviors that were reliably coded as conveying pride at around 4 years of age. Children began to apply the label/term “pride” to a photograph conveying pride in another peer at around 4 years of age and recognized their own experience as one of pride following a competitive task at around 5 years of age.