Kids may be hardwired to 'share and share alike': study

German toddlers, seen in 2007, choose toys to play with in the garden at the Spreekita Kindergarten in Berlin. Humans are selfish in earliest childhood but by the age of seven or eight are keen to share equally, a developmental change so sudden that it can only be explained, at least in part, by genes, according to a study released Wednesday.(AFP/File/John Macdougall)

PARIS (AFP) - Humans are selfish in earliest childhood but by the age of seven or eight are keen to share equally, a developmental change so sudden that it can only be explained, at least in part, by genes, according to a study released Wednesday.

Behavioural scientists and sociologists have quarrelled for decades as to whether generosity and selfishness are inherited or result from social conditioning.

But new experiments with 229 Swiss children between the ages of three and eight suggest that Homo sapiens is probably somewhere in between: humans look out for No. 1, but also express, if not outright generosity, at least an aversion to inequality.

At least one result was unexpected, said Fehr: children with no siblings were more, rather than less, generous.