Giving priority to race or wealth in peer group contexts involving social inclusion.

Abstract

This study investigated children's and adolescents' predictions regarding intergroup inclusion in contexts where peers differed on two dimensions of group membership: race and wealth. African American and European American participants (N = 153; age range: 8-14 years, M age = 11.46 years) made predictions about whether afterschool clubs would prefer to include a peer based on race or wealth and reported what they personally thought should happen. Between late childhood and early adolescence, European American participants increasingly expected that afterschool clubs would include a samewealth peer (even when this peer was of a different race) whereas African American participants increasingly expected that the afterschool clubs would include a same-race peer (even when this peer was of a different level of wealth). Both European American and African American participants themselves thought that the clubs should include a same-wealth peer over a same-race peer, and with age, were increasingly likely to reference perceived comfort when explaining their decision. Future studies on the development of racial preferences will benefit from including wealth status information given that, with age, perceived comfort was associated with same-wealth rather than same-race status.

Group Norms Influence Children’s Expectations About Status Based on Wealth and Popularity

“…Regardless of whether children make more favorable assumptions about high- or low-wealth groups, they may generally believe that both groups prefer their in-group. This explanation would be consistent with evidence that children expect peers to prefer affiliation with their own wealth group even those wealth in-group members are out-group members on another dimension such as race ( Burkholder et al, 2021 ). Also in line with evidence that norms of inclusion can mitigate prejudice ( Nesdale et al, 2007 ; Nesdale and Lawson, 2011 ), our findings suggest that although children may hold pre-existing beliefs about wealth groups are exclusive, norms of inclusion may broadly reduce their perceptions of social barriers between high- and low-status groups.…”

“…Evidence that children readily endorse stereotypes about high- and low-wealth groups suggests that wealth is a particularly informative status distinction. Moreover, children expect their peers to preferentially include others on the basis of wealth due to more perceived comfort with their own group ( Burkholder et al, 2021 ). They may assume that groups are exclusive even in the absence of an explicit norm ( Burkholder et al, 2020 , 2021 ) and thus, more readily generalize an individual group member’s exclusive preferences to a wealth group than a popularity group.…”

“…Moreover, children expect their peers to preferentially include others on the basis of wealth due to more perceived comfort with their own group ( Burkholder et al, 2021 ). They may assume that groups are exclusive even in the absence of an explicit norm ( Burkholder et al, 2020 , 2021 ) and thus, more readily generalize an individual group member’s exclusive preferences to a wealth group than a popularity group. On its own, popularity status may be less informative for predicting behavior during childhood.…”

Testing the effectiveness of the Developing Inclusive Youth program: A multisite randomized control trial

“…As social exclusion was a central form of prejudice in the intervention, one of the outcome measures centered on whether participants viewed intergroup social exclusion as wrong and how likely they thought intergroup inclusion occurs (Burkholder et al, 2021; Cooley et al, 2019; Ruck et al, 2011) (see Figure 2). We also measured trait attributions and competency beliefs about diverse peers, as these biases have been theorized to improve as a function of direct and indirect intergroup contact (Tropp et al, 2014).…”

Children’s Perspectives on Fairness and Inclusivity in the Classroom

“…Developmental research has explored how children think about social inequalities (Burkholder et al, 2021; Elenbaas & Killen, 2016; Olson et al, 2012; Rizzo & Killen, 2016), the role of group identity in these scenarios (Elenbaas et al, 2016), and the role of group identity in peer inclusion/exclusion contexts (Cooley et al, 2019). Meanwhile, educational research has established the pervasive presence of teacher racial bias (İnan-Kaya & Rubie-Davies, 2022; Starck et al, 2020; Tenenbaum & Ruck, 2007) and the associated negative impacts of bias and discrimination at school, primarily for racial-ethnic minority students (Gasser et al, 2018; Greene et al, 2006; Peterson et al, 2016).…”