Children’s resource taking varies with experimentally manipulated relative status

How do relative status and gender shape children’s resource taking? In two preregistered studies, 4–8-year-olds completed a competitive ‘Where’s Waldo?’ task and then decided how many tokens to take from a new peer. In Study 1 (N = 195; 49% girls), children competed against a pre-recorded peer and were randomly assigned to win or lose. Next, they chose one of two unfamiliar peers (a prior “winner” or “loser”) and selected how many tokens to take from that chosen peer. Children with low relative status (‘losers’ taking from ‘winners’) took more than half the tokens, whereas high status children (‘winners’ taking from ‘losers’) did not differ from an equal split. Under equal status, boys took more than half, whereas girls did not differ from an equal split. In Study 2 (N = 101; 48% girls), children played against the clock (without a peer competitor) and were randomly assigned to succeed or fail. In this non-social context, children took more than half of their peers’ tokens. A cross-study comparison indicates that taking is calibrated to socially instantiated relative status, not performance per se, and that gender differences arise only under equal status. These findings reveal early status sensitivity and specify when gender differences in taking emerge.