Gender socialization influences children at early ages, shaping their developing identities. The toys provided by parents deliver some of the earliest gender-based messages by encouraging children to engage in activities associated with, for example, dolls and trucks. In the current study, we measured the influence of parental socialization by assessing 5-and 12 ½-month-old infants' exposure to dolls and trucks and by experimentally manipulating parents' encouragement to play with these toys. We found that infants displayed gender-typical toy preferences at 12 ½, but not 5 months, a pattern characteristic of previous studies. However, brief encouragement by a parent to play with toys from each category was ineffective in altering infants' preferences. Rather, the types of toys present in the home predicted preferences, suggesting that at-home exposure to toys may be influential in the development of toy preferences. These findings reveal that socialization processes may indeed play a role in the formation of early gender-typical toy preferences and highlight the importance of equal toy exposure during infancy to ensure optimal development.

Historically, research has been used by systems of authority to marginalize and oppress minoritized populations. Family scientists have recently begun the work of disentangling themselves from these oppressive legacies (e. g., White supremacist, sexist, heterosexist, cisgenderist, etc.). As such, the field is at a vital crux in which there is a need to challenge prevailing quantitative methodological assumptions and practices in order to address and disrupt how statistical analyses can shape family sciences away from a social‐justice agenda. Drawing upon principles of critical social theory, critical race theory, and Black Feminist scholarship, this article elaborates on how family scientists can utilize Quantitative Criticalism, or QuantCrit, as a framework for conducting social justice‐orientated quantitative research. We conclude by illustrating how the tenets of QuantCrit can be utilized throughout the research process. It is our hope that readers will identify moments in their own scholarship in which these tenets can be applied.

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