In the United States, there is an unfortunate yet pervasive gender gap in wages: Women tend to make less than men for doing the same work. One prominent account for why this wage gap exists is that women and men negotiate differently. However, we currently do not know whether differences in negotiation are a product of extensive experience or are deeply rooted in development. Here, we brought data from children to bear on this important question. We gave 240 children between the ages of 4 and 9 years old a chance to negotiate for a bonus with a female or a male evaluator. Boys asked for the same bonus from a male and a female evaluator. Older girls, in contrast, asked for a smaller bonus from a male than a female evaluator. Our findings suggest that a gender gap in negotiation emerges surprisingly early in development, highlighting childhood as a key period for interventions.

中文翻译：

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儿童在谈判中表现出性别差距

在美国，工资方面存在一个令人遗憾但普遍存在的性别差距：女性在做同样的工作时往往比男性赚的少。之所以存在这种工资差距的一个重要原因是，女性和男性的谈判方式不同。但是，我们目前不知道谈判中的分歧是经验丰富的产物还是根深蒂固的发展。在这里，我们带来了儿童的数据来解决这个重要问题。我们为 240 名 4 至 9 岁的儿童提供了与女性或男性评估员协商奖金的机会。男孩要求男性和女性评估员提供相同的奖金。相比之下，年龄较大的女孩向男性要求的奖金比女性评估者要少。我们的研究结果表明，谈判中的性别差距在发展早期出人意料地出现，