One of the oldest ways of showing the practical realization of a call to holiness is the imitation of Christ. In the past this idea, with additional role models included, was also used in the moral theological refection on human development and sanctifcation. However, those attempts found it diffcult to defne the subject of imitation as well as imitation itself. Also today, with some reservations, the idea of imitation can be used for a methodical presentation of the Christian vocation to holiness and of concrete ways how this vocation can be realized. When taken together with the biblical category of the vocation and of the gift, this idea allows to present Christian moral life in a synthetic way and can be the reference point for specifc moral obligations. However, when using the category of imitation in the correct presentation of a call to holiness, correct terms are needed as well as an understanding of the vocation as found in Revelation and in particular and modern behavioural sciences. Such a presentation would emphasize important features of Christian morality, especially its religious, personalistic and social character, and would manifest misconceptions of both extreme autonomy and extreme heteronomy.
Previous research showed that children can exhibit preferences for social categories already at preschool age. One of the crucial factors in the development of children’s attitudes toward others is children’s observation and imitation of adults’ nonverbal messages. The aim of our study is to examine whether children’s tendency to perceive and follow nonverbally expressed attitudes toward other people is related to ingroup bias, i.e. the tendency to favor one’s own group over other groups. We examined 175 preschool children (age in months: 61–87; M = 72.6, SD = 6.53) presenting them with a video of a conversation between a message sender and a message recipient. The study was conducted in a minimal group paradigm. We found that children accurately identified the message sender’s attitude toward the recipient and also generalized this attitude to other members of the new group. We also found explicit ingroup bias among children from the message sender’s group. However, no generalization of the sender’s attitude to other ingroup members was found. The results are discussed in reference to previous findings on the role of imitation of adult’s non-verbal behavior for the development of social attitudes among children.