Children’s classification and lexicalization of attractiveness, gender, and race: Differential displays of these concepts and relatedness to bias and flexibility

Abstract

Minimal research has examined children’s functional use of attractiveness to classify and label others, an important step in the development of children’s biases. This study compared 3-to 11-year-olds’ classification, sorting, and labeling of others and themselves based on attractiveness, gender, and race, and investigated whether these abilities and other characteristics predicted children’s bias and flexibility. Relative to gender and race, children rarely used attractiveness to spontaneously classify people and were less accurate at sorting and labeling others and themselves by attractiveness, suggesting they have a less explicit concept of attractiveness. Predictors of bias differed depending upon domain and assessment method (forced choice or non-forced choice), showing that children’s bias is affected by both individual differences and task characteristics. Predictors of flexibility differed based on whether children were assigning positive or negative traits to target children, demonstrating that the valence of attributes is an important consideration when conceptualizing children’s flexibility.

Racial Categorization Predicts Implicit Racial Bias in Preschool Children

“…Developmental theories and previous research have suggested that social categorization is a sufficient and necessary antecedent to intergroup bias and discrimination (Allen & Wilder, ; Bigler & Liben, ; Billig & Tajfel, ; Rennels & Langlois, ; Tajfel & Turner, ). Regarding explicit racial bias, a few studies have found it to be positively associated with children's social categorization skills (e.g., Bigler & Liben, ).…”

“…This is based on the findings of several existing studies examining the relation between children's social classification skills and their explicit social biases. For example, Rennels and Langlois () found that the number of dimensions (e.g., gender, race, and attractiveness) on which children could classify faces predicted their explicit gender bias. Moreover, Bigler and Liben () demonstrated that school‐aged children's ability to categorize people on various dimensions, such as race, gender, and age, predicted their explicit racial stereotypes.…”

Az igazságügyi szakértői interjú és az élményszerűség vizsgálata

“…Stresszreakciók és a kommunikációs síkok (verbális és nonverbális) közötti diszharmóniák (megtévesztő jelzések) figyelmeztetésére elegendők. (Meyer, 2010) A szakirodalmakban ismertetett téves arcképfelismerések esetében érdemes megjegyezni, hogy a gyermekek legtöbbje erősen szimpátia és előítélet-vezérelt, amely megnöveli a téves választások számát (Rennels -Langlois, 2014), illetve amíg kérdéses a gyermek memóriaműködésének állapota, addig nem célszerű a Ki volt? vagy Ő volt?…”

Differential Trajectories in the Development of Attractiveness Biases Toward Female and Male Targets

“…For example, when 3-to 6.5-year-olds were asked what it means to be pretty or cute, the oldest aged girls provided the most detailed descriptions [48]. Similarly, when 3-to 11-year-olds were asked to sort and label pictures of peers based on attractiveness, girls were significantly more accurate at this task than boys [63].…”