A new Nature Human Behaviour study reports that boys’ preference for belonging to larger groups appears by the preschool years and parallels stronger support for group-based social hierarchy among adult men.
Researchers at the University of Oslo compared responses from 180 infants, 317 preschoolers and 3,467 adults using simple images of larger and smaller groups. Infants showed no consistent preference, but preschool boys were more likely than girls to favor members of a majority group. Among adults, men were also more likely than women to prefer the larger group, and that preference was associated with political attitudes favoring hierarchy, including greater support for militarism and opposition to redistribution.
The authors describe the pattern as a possible early-developing motive to associate with more “formidable” coalitions—groups whose larger numbers could provide an advantage in competition. The study used abstract groups without real-world racial, ethnic or national identities, an effort to separate group-size preferences from learned stereotypes. However, the research was not a longitudinal study following the same boys into adulthood, so it cannot show that a preschool preference directly causes later political beliefs.
Instead, the findings indicate a developmental and gender-linked association that may help explain why support for hierarchy differs across adults.