We present results with these covariates included to allow comparability to past studies e. Coefficients for each variable reflect values at Step 4. Race of the participant was effect coded with White as the reference group. Once all variables were taken into account in the final model see Table 2 , only age remained a significant and unique predictor of in-group stereotyping. Neither context nor the social-cognitive variables i. Once all variables were taken into account in the final model see Table 2 , two variables remained significant and unique predictors of out-group stereotyping.
Using 1, re-samples, the moderated mediation revealed that the indirect effect of social context on out-group stereotyping through race essentialism was moderated by age. Notably, when we controlled for race in all analyses reported thus far, the pattern of results did not change and participant race did not contribute significantly to the models. The target stereotyping analyses presented in the Supplementary Materials did not support this prediction.
Critically, additional analyses showed that the social-cognitive variable hypothesized to explain social context differences in out-group stereotyping i. Second, as predicted, race salience increased with age, and race was equally salient across both contexts, but children differed substantially in the extent to which they essentialized race with age across contexts. Race essentialism uniquely predicted out-group stereotyping, controlling for background variables e. Finally, the moderated mediation analysis showed that contextual difference in essentializing race helped explain the geographic differences in out-group stereotyping, but only among older children.
One possibility is children may simply be exposed to different sets of racial stereotypes based on the predominant minority groups in that social context. Recent research has found that reduced intergroup bias typically found among racial minority children may be explained, at least in part, by awareness of social status differences e. Specifically, those lower in the social hierarchy which often maps on to racial minority status tend to exhibit less intergroup bias. Among the target stereotypes assessed i.
Importantly, race essentialism—representative of the lens through which children interpret their context—helped explain geographic differences in out-group stereotyping as shown in the moderated mediation analysis. Consistent with a social context rather than racial-group membership argument and recent work with adults Carpinella et al.
Given the lack of evidence supporting a status-based explanation and the lack of an effect of participant race, it is unlikely that the current results can be explained simply by a difference in sample diversity. Differences in the type of stereotypes used across the two settings seem to reflect context-level differences in stereotypes, but future research should carefully examine the role of group-status, numerical minority status, and group exposure to disentangle what may be driving such contextual differences in racial stereotyping. The examination of panethnic stereotypes Asian American did not allow us to examine the potential variation that exists in stereotyping among individual Asian ethnicities.
Asian is a broad panethnic category that includes many ethnicities that differ substantially in their history, norms, and culture Alegria et al. The photos used in the racial stereotyping task depicted East Asian individuals, and the stereotypes measured while also considered broad Asian stereotypes are most associated with this group.
From groups to individuals
There is important variability in the economic status of different Asian ethnicities that could affect social contextual differences in racial stereotyping. It will be important for future research to consider such differences and how these judgments are situated within a particular intergroup context. Even if race is psychologically salient, in social contexts that foster racial integration and intergroup contact, race may be essentialized less and subsequent negative intergroup outcomes may be reduced see Deeb et al. In line with this theory, the present findings suggest that children who essentialize race also stereotype out-group members to a greater extent.
Importantly, we found that not all children essentialized race; those in a racially diverse context did not essentialize race more with age, whereas those in a more racially homogenous context did essentialize race more with age. Hirschfeld, , a factor highlighted through studying unique intergroup contexts, as we did here. In diverse contexts characterized by intergroup conflict, exposure to diversity may serve to increase race essentialism and corresponding out-group stereotyping.
Future work should aim to quantify and measure these specific features e. Although race salience and essentialism may invariably support the acquisition of racial stereotypes, the meaning imbued to these processes should depend on environmental input. For example, categorization used in a particular context for the purpose of communication and creating bridges may engender a very different outcome than categorization used for segregation and distributing limited resources.
Moreover certain contexts, for example, those that are racially heterogeneous may encourage less essentialist reasoning about race Deeb et al. A number of studies with adults have demonstrated the ability to manipulate essentialist thinking about groups e. This research was supported by a Jacab K. Amanda Williams, University of Bristol. National Center for Biotechnology Information , U. Author manuscript; available in PMC Sep 1.
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See other articles in PMC that cite the published article. Abstract The authors explored the differential emergence and correlates of racial stereotyping in children ages 4—11 years across two broad social contexts: Race Salience, Race Essentialism and Racial Stereotyping Numerous factors contribute to the emergence of racial stereotyping in children, but here we concentrate on two social-cognitive components: Race essentialism The extent to which children stereotype out-groups may depend not only on the extent to which race is salient, but also their conceptualizations about the meaning of race.
The Present Research The present investigation had two primary aims. Age and social-cognitive predictions Since children start to demonstrate ethnic and racial awareness as young as 3 or 4 years of age e. Measures and Procedure Parents were informed of the study via letters sent home by school administrators, or by phone or in person for those children recruited from the community.
Stimuli The photos used in all the tasks described below i.
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Racial stereotyping We used the stereotyping task developed in Pauker et al. Race salience Using procedures reported in Pauker et al. Open in a separate window. Race essentialism Three items were used to assess the perceived immutability of race modeled after previous tasks Hirschfeld, ; Ruble et al. Geographic Social Context Differences in Racial Stereotyping Using linear regression, we first examined geographic differences in racial stereotyping that emerged with age. Social-cognitive Factors and Racial Stereotyping Age and contextual differences in social-cognitive factors We used a logistic regression to examine the effect of age, context, and their interaction on race salience.
Do race salience and race essentialism relate to in-group and out-group stereotyping? Age x Context Interaction. Could context differences be due to specific target stereotypes? On the Malleability of Stereotypes Although race salience and essentialism may invariably support the acquisition of racial stereotypes, the meaning imbued to these processes should depend on environmental input. Supplementary Material Supp Info Click here to view. Acknowledgments This research was supported by a Jacab K.
International Journal of Intercultural Relations. The development of ethnic attitudes: Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology. Testing and interpreting interactions. Reno RR Contributor, editor. Considering context, place and culture: International Journal of Methods in Psychiatric Research. The nature of prejudice. Learning not to talk about race: When older children underperform in social categorization. Formation and change of ethnic and national stereotypes: Current Directions in Psychological Science.
Ethnic role salience in racially homogeneous and heterogeneous societies. Reconceptualizing research on prejudice. Personality and Social Psychology Review. The transmission of racial attitudes within the family. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. From a different vantage: Intergroup attitudes among children from low-and intermediate-status racial groups. Psychological essentialism in children.
Understanding constraints on inheritance: Evidence for biological thinking in early childhood. British Journal of Developmental Psychology. Is Hawaii the Answer? A versatile computational tool for observed variable mediation, moderation, and conditional process modeling [White paper] Retrieved from http: Do children have a theory of race?
Racists or tolerant multiculturalists? How do they begin? Stereotype formation and endorsement: The role of implicit theories. European Journal of Social Psychology. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology.
Race Salience and Essentialist Thinking in Racial Stereotype Development
Temple University Press; Children associate racial groups with wealth: Evidence from South Africa. Race salience and essentialist thinking in racial stereotype development. A meta-analytic test of intergroup contact theory. Psychological essentialism of human categories. Development of ethnic, racial, and national prejudice in childhood and adolescence: A multinational meta-analysis of age differences.
Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology. Social status as a predictor of race and gender stereotypes in late childhood and early adolescence. Bennett M, Sani F, editors.
Awareness of racism affects how children do socially and academically
The development of the social self. The role of gender constancy in early gender development. Exposure to racial ambiguity influences lay theories of race. Social Psychology and Personality Science. Race preferences in children: Insights from South Africa. The photographed individuals also differed with respect to a variety of other non-systematic dimensions e. After the initial sort, the experimenter asked the participant if there was an additional way to sort the photos. This continued until the participant could no longer think of dimensions upon which to sort the photos.
Children who did not complete a successful sort were given a score of 0. Children who were able to sort the stimuli according to one dimension, but were not able to re-sort the stimuli in a new way were given a score of 1. For this and all subsequent coding tasks, two experimenters independently coded the responses. Race salience was gauged by two measures: In this task, two arrays of six same-gender photographs, one all-White and one racially-diverse, were presented to participants, counterbalanced across trials. Participants were asked whether the people in the photographs were the same or different and why they were the same or different see Semaj, Although they both indicate race salience, the first measure sort by race more clearly represents functional use of race, whereas the second measure racial justification more clearly represents noticing and describing a perceptual difference in the array.
The stimuli used in the sort by race measure varied along many systematic dimensions. On the other hand, the stimuli used in the racial justification measure appeared similar on all dimensions, except for race, and we specifically asked children what made the pictures the same or different. Therefore, the stimuli intentionally highlighted racial differences and restricted available alternative descriptions. Because of this conceptual difference, we kept the two measures separate since others have found that functional use of categories exacerbates intergroup bias compared to just noticing perceptual differences Bigler, ; Bigler et al.
We modified previous tasks used to assess racial or gender constancy Hirschfeld, ; Semaj, ; Ruble et al. Two questions were used to assess stability i. Again, we used two indicators to assess stability: Children responses to the items relating to identification and stability were coded as correct 1 or incorrect 0. Children only received a 1 for the consistency item if the initial question was answered correctly and if the follow-up question indicated true constancy by utilizing essentialist reasoning e.
Finally, the scores were added together to form a composite score, with higher scores indicating a greater sense of racial constancy for the self or others. In sum, we employed two types of broad measures: The predictor variables included factors we wanted to control for i. Recall, participants chose which child was most likely to exhibit a behavior, and each target episode was coded as in-group stereotype or out-group stereotype relevant. To explore age group differences in positive and negative in-group and out-group stereotyping, we submitted the stereotyping scores averaged across items to a 2 Group: In a first pass, we included sex and race of the participant in the analyses, but no differences were obtained as a function of sex, race, or any of their interactions so analyses collapsed across these variables.
Bonferroni multiple comparisons used to explore the reliable age group differences in out-group stereotyping revealed that the two older groups exhibited more out-group stereotyping overall than the two younger groups. Values outside parentheses indicate means; values inside indicate standard deviations.
Given the strong differences in out-group stereotyping and the lack of relative age group differences in in-group stereotyping, we sought to explore predictors of the emergence of out-group stereotyping. We were particularly interested in whether race salience and essentialist thinking in racial constancy uniquely predicted the emergence of out-group stereotypes.
Although not a central focus of this paper, Table 2 provides means for age group differences across all of our predictors. At least half of the children exhibited perfect classification skills, sorted by race, and used a racial justification by 5—6 years of age. Racial constancy for self and others emerged slightly later, with the majority of children achieving a perfect score around 6—7 years of age.
Because of the significant positive relationships between racial stereotyping and many of the predictors Table 3 , we performed multiple hierarchical regressions to determine the extent to which each predictor contributed unique variance in explaining patterns of out-group stereotyping. All regressions and correlations used age as a continuous variable. Seventy-four subjects were included in this analysis, since twelve subjects did not complete racial constancy measures due to time constraints, and an additional three subjects had incomplete answers for the racial justification task.
As displayed in Table 4, in Steps 1—3, we entered a number of factors for which we wanted to control in the regression: In Step 4, we entered our first predictors of interest: In Step 5, we entered our final predictors of interest: Once all variables were taken into account in the final model see Table 4 , none of the background variables i. As predicted, the factors that remained significant in the final model were those related to race salience and essentialist thinking: Note, however, that only one of our measures of race salience remained significant in the final model, namely sorting by race.
Racial justification was not a significant predictor in the final model, which highlights perhaps the importance of functional use of race i. On the other hand, both predictors of racial constancy contributed significantly towards explaining out-group stereotyping. Specifically, racial constancy for others was associated with increased out-group stereotyping; whereas racial constancy for the self was associated with decreased out-group stereotyping.
This suggests that it is essentialist thinking specific to out-groups—not essentialist thinking construed more broadly—that predicts out-group stereotyping. Coefficients for each variable reflect values at Step 5. Responses were coded into one of four categories: We then employed chi-square analyses to compare the frequency of each type of reasoning across age groups 3—5 years, 5—6 years, 6—7 years, 7—10 years. Sixty-eight subjects were included in this analysis, since six additional subjects completed the study without being asked why racial identity could or could not change. As displayed in Table 5 , the patterns of reasoning across age groups was similar both for judgments of the self and others, except in the two younger groups.
For the two older age groups, children primarily used essentialist reasoning across both types of judgments 6—7-year-olds: Percentage of children who report different types of reasoning to explain why or why they could not change to a different race. These initial displays of stereotyping, around 6 years of age, were mainly restricted to out-group stereotypes, but importantly, involved the use of both positive and negative stereotypes.
Such a finding dovetails with recent theoretical work outlining the bases of racial stereotyping Bigler and Liben, Consistent with a social-motivational model e. Children only oriented themselves towards out-group stereotypes once race became a functionally salient dimension and they developed a sense of the out-group as an essential category. Stimulus salience has been shown to play a pivotal role in how individuals process social category information Taylor, As race becomes a salient dimension to children, they may begin to organize information around racial categories, and consequently form social stereotypes.
As predicted, European American, racial majority children, who tend to have a less salient racial identity than racial minority children in the U. Racial constancy for others predicted increases in out-group stereotyping and racial constancy for the self predicted decreases in out-group stereotyping. One difference between the two tasks that could explain this difference in predictive power is that one relied primarily on images racial constancy for others while the other required knowledge of verbal labels racial constancy for the self.
While a plausible explanation, both tasks required knowledge of a verbal label to pass the task. Instead, we believe that this difference may be accounted for by the ease with which children essentialize the out-group versus the in-group and the effect that essentialist thinking applied to the out-group or in-group has on intergroup perceptions.
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Future research should certainly attempt to disentangle these factors and how they affect the emergence of racial stereotyping. Although not a central focus of the current study, children reliably demonstrated racial constancy, specifically for others, around 6 years of age.
Thus, as children start to essentialize out-groups, they may also become aware of stereotypes associated with these groups. For example, explicit information presented in books, TV, or educational curricula and implicit or explicit information communicated by family, teachers, or friends may provide specific stereotype content Bar-Tal, Studies with adults have argued that more powerful groups namely, the racial majority attribute more stereotypes to those lower in the hierarchy to justify and legitimize their power Yzerbyt et al.
Young children are aware of status differentials Bigler, et al. While race salience may be a natural developmental acquisition in an environment where race is functionally important, racial stereotyping may not be an inevitable consequence of racial categorization or cognitive development. Certain social-contextual factors encourage more or less essentialist thinking about race, which provide scaffolding for children to make errors in judgment i. Future research should explore the types of contexts that minimize essentialist thinking about race and the types of educational strategies that curb the impact of pervasive explicit and implicit racial associations available in the environment.
Moreover, the current study suggests an implied underlying model of how age, cognitive skills, racial constancy, race salience, and essentialism work in concert to influence racial stereotyping. Future research should test this model explicitly using path analysis or SEM. Children exhibit a reliable in-group bias early on, some as young as 3, well before the emergence of racial stereotyping documented in the present study e. While many have interpreted this in-group bias as evidence that children possess negative racial attitudes, others have questioned the validity of this claim, arguing these findings reflect in-group preferences rather than true out-group derogation e.
Thus, while young children can label and organize their world by race early on—skills conducive to in-group preferences—they might not be able to symbolize an underlying concept and its associated attributes until they form a coherent essentialist theory about race.
The recognition of race as a psychologically salient dimension, early social preferences, and biological lay theories that all presumably develop in the preschool years provide a solid foundation upon which this developing system of social cognition—including both racial attitudes and stereotypes—can be built. Similar to racial stereotyping, a number of motivational factors may contribute towards racial preferences becoming full-fledged racial attitudes, such as an explicit norm of prejudice in the environment or tension over limited resources Nesdale, Thus, while children may have the foundation for racial attitudes and stereotypes early on, a host of motivational factors promote their consolidation into underlying concepts that guide behavior.
Our sample included mainly racial majority i. The findings and models did not change when the sample of Asian American and multiracial children were removed from analyses. The one exception was that the comparison of in-group stereotyping to chance was no longer significant in the oldest age group consistent with our conclusion that European American, majority-children are primarily learning out-group stereotypes. It will be important for future research to explore these processes with racial minority children.
Crucially, research should also consider how these processes work specifically with multiracial children whose existence challenges binary views of race. Our sample of children attended schools and lived in neighborhoods primarily composed of European Americans. Future research should explore factors that predict the emergence of racial stereotypes in minority and multiracial populations and how structural aspects of the environment can shape the emergence of stereotyping.
Additionally, although our study deliberately focused on a wide age-range, future research should home in on factors that magnify race salience and exacerbate essentialist thinking in 3—6 year-olds. The current research suggests that two potential factors play a key role in stereotyping racial out-groups: Mitigating these factors should precipitate positive change. If children learn that race is not necessarily an immutable category and that even if the physicality of skin color is often immutable, it does not necessarily convey stable information about psychological attributes, perhaps they will be less susceptible to stereotyping others and to the adverse effects of stereotyping themselves.
We are extremely grateful to all the children, parents, teachers and administrators who helped make this project possible. This research was supported by a Jacob K. Kristin Pauker, Stanford University. Nalini Ambady, Tufts University. National Center for Biotechnology Information , U. Author manuscript; available in PMC Nov 1. Author information Copyright and License information Disclaimer. Kristin Pauker, Stanford University;. The publisher's final edited version of this article is available at Child Dev. See other articles in PMC that cite the published article. Abstract The authors explored the emergence and antecedents of racial stereotyping in 89 children ages 3—10 years.
Race Salience Racial stereotyping must be preceded by an understanding that race is a meaningful basis for social categorization. The Present Research The present investigation focused on two primary aims. Method Participants and Design Eighty-nine children were recruited from the local community through mail solicitations to parents and from four suburban public elementary schools that serve middle and upper-middle income families outside Boston, Massachusetts.
Measures and Procedure Parents were informed of the study via letters sent home by school administrators or by phone for those children recruited from the community. Racial Stereotyping Forty-eight high-resolution photos of male children were arranged into 24 pairs. Classification Task Using procedures reported in Bigler , the classification task was comprised of 16 photographs of people cropped at the waist who varied systematically on several dimensions: Race Salience Race salience was gauged by two measures: Judgments of the self Identification i.
Racial constancy and essentialist reasoning Children responses to the items relating to identification and stability were coded as correct 1 or incorrect 0. Stereotyping To explore age group differences in positive and negative in-group and out-group stereotyping, we submitted the stereotyping scores averaged across items to a 2 Group: Open in a separate window.
In-group and out-group stereotyping across age group. Table 1 In-group and out-group positive and negative stereotyping by age group. Positive Negative Positive Negative 3—5 year-olds. Predictors of Out-group Stereotyping Age group differences in predictors Although not a central focus of this paper, Table 2 provides means for age group differences across all of our predictors.
Table 2 Age group differences in predictor variables.
The problem of generalization
Hierarchical regression Because of the significant positive relationships between racial stereotyping and many of the predictors Table 3 , we performed multiple hierarchical regressions to determine the extent to which each predictor contributed unique variance in explaining patterns of out-group stereotyping. Table 3 Correlations among variables.
Racial constancy for self. Racial constancy for others. Table 5 Percentage of children who report different types of reasoning to explain why or why they could not change to a different race. Limitations Our sample included mainly racial majority i. Acknowledgments We are extremely grateful to all the children, parents, teachers and administrators who helped make this project possible. Identity constancy in children: Developmental processes and implications.
Individual change and development. Routledge and Kegan Paul; Stereotype susceptibility in children: Effects of identity activation on quantitative performance. Learning not to talk about race: When older children underperform in social categorization. Nature and nurture in own-race face processing. The development of implicit attitudes: Evidence of race evaluations from ages 6 and 10 and adulthood. Development of social categories and stereotypes in early childhood: International Journal of Intercultural Relations.
Formation and change of ethnic and national stereotypes: Bastian B, Haslam N. Psychological essentialism and stereotype endorsement. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology. A study of the functional use of gender in the classroom. The politics of race and gender: Analyses of Social Issues and Public Policy. Race and the workforce: Occupational status, aspirations, and stereotyping among African American children. When groups are not created equal: Effects of group status on the formation of intergroup attitudes in children. Social categorization and the formation of intergroup attitudes in children.
A cognitive-developmental approach to racial stereotyping and reconstructive memory in Euro-American children.