Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society

Caregiving is essential to human survival and flourishing, yet it has been largely overlooked across scientific disciplines, including economics, philosophy, politics, and, importantly – cognitive science. Caregiving remains poorly understood, in part, because it does not fit neatly within traditional frameworks of human cognition and behavior (Gopnik, 2023). Take, for instance, theories of morality and cooperation (Kleiman-Weiner, Saxe, & Tenenbaum, 2017; Powell, 2022). Unlike the principle of universalism, which emphasizes impartiality, caregiving involves prioritizing the needs of specific individuals over others (Gilligan, 1993). Caregiving also directly challenges the utilitarian principle of "the greatest good for the greatest number", since it involves actions that benefit others at significant personal cost. Furthermore, caregiving diverges from the principle of reciprocity – a cornerstone of human cooperation – because caregivers generally do not expect anything in return for their actions (Fiske, 1992).