Social Facilitation of Laughter and Smiles in Preschool Children

The dataset from Caspar Addyman's study contains observations of 20 preschool children aged 31-49 months. It records counts of laughs and smiles while children watched cartoons under individual, paired, and group viewing conditions. The analysis showed children laughed eight times more and smiled almost three times as much in social viewing conditions.

Use Cases

• Analyze the effect of social presence on laughter frequency based on viewing condition.
• Compare smile and laugh rates between individual and group settings.
• Study the relationship between subjective funniness ratings and group size.
• Model social facilitation effects in preschool-aged children.

Strengths

• Includes data from 20 children (9 boys, 11 girls) with a specific age range (31-49 months).
• Compares three distinct experimental conditions: individual, pair, and group viewing.
• Analysis scripts and preprint are provided alongside the dataset.

Limitations

• Row count and column-level documentation are unknown; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Sample size of 20 children may limit generalizability of findings.

Provenance

Source

Caspar Addyman

Collection Method

Experimental study where children watched three cartoons under three different social conditions.