Human Development & Quantitative Methodology

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Science resource inequalities viewed as less wrong when girls are disadvantaged
(Wiley, 2022-08-08) Sims, Riley N.; Burkholder, Amanda R.; Killen, Melanie
In response to some resource inequalities, children give priority to moral concerns. Yet, in others, children show ingroup preferences in their evaluations and resource allocations. The present study built upon this knowledge by investigating children's and young adults’ (N = 144; 5–6-year-olds, Mage = 5.83, SDage = .97; 9–11-year-olds, Mage = 10.74, SDage = .68; and young adults, Mage = 19.92, SDage = 1.10) evaluations and allocation decisions in a science inequality context. Participants viewed vignettes in which male and female groups received unequal amounts of science supplies, then evaluated the acceptability of the resource inequalities, allocated new boxes of science supplies between the groups, and provided justifications for their choices. Results revealed both children and young adults evaluated inequalities of science resources less negatively when girls were disadvantaged than when boys were disadvantaged. Further, 5- to 6-year-old participants and male participants rectified science resource inequalities to a greater extent when the inequality disadvantaged boys compared to when it disadvantaged girls. Generally, participants who used moral reasoning to justify their responses negatively evaluated and rectified the resource inequalities, whereas participants who used group-focused reasoning positively evaluated and perpetuated the inequalities, though some age and participant gender findings emerged. Together, these findings reveal subtle gender biases that may contribute to perpetuating gender-based science inequalities both in childhood and adulthood.
Testing the effectiveness of the Developing Inclusive Youth program: A multisite randomized control trial
(Wiley, 2022-05-25) Killen, Melanie; Burkholder, Amanda R.; D'Esterre, Alexander P.; Sims, Riley N.; Glidden, Jacquelyn; Yee, Kathryn M.; Luken Raz, Katherine V.; Elenbaas, Laura; Rizzo, Michael T.; Woodward, Bonnie; Samuelson, Arvid; Sweet, Tracy M.; Stapleton, Laura M. Killen, M., Burkholder, A. R., D’Esterre, A. P., Sims, R. N., Glidden, J., Yee, K. M., Luken Raz, K. V., Elenbaas, L., Rizzo, M. T., Woodward, B., Samuelson, A., Sweet, T. M., Stapleton, L. M. (2022). Testing the effectiveness of the Developing Inclusive Youth program: A multisite randomized control trial. Child Development, 93, 732–750.
The Developing Inclusive Youth program is a classroom-based, individually administered video tool that depicts peer-based social and racial exclusion, combined with teacher-led discussions. A multisite randomized control trial was implemented with 983 participants (502 females; 58.5% White, 41.5% Ethnic/racial minority; Mage = 9.64 years) in 48 third-, fourth-, and fifth-grade classrooms across six schools. Children in the program were more likely to view interracial and same-race peer exclusion as wrong, associate positive traits with peers of different racial, ethnic, and gender backgrounds, and report play with peers from diverse backgrounds than were children in the control group. Many approaches are necessary to achieve antiracism in schools. This intervention is one component of this goal for developmental science.
CHILDREN’S DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE AND FRIENDSHIP PREFERENCES IN GENDER STEREOTYPED CONTEXTS
(2023) Sims, Riley N.; Killen, Melanie; Human Development; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
From an early age, children prefer fair and just treatment of others. Young children often reason about the importance of establishing equality between individuals and groups, with concerns for equity emerging by middle childhood. At the same time, children expect that individuals who counter gender stereotypic norms will face exclusion from the peer group, and give preferential treatment towards gender ingroup members over gender outgroup members in resource allocation tasks. Denying individuals from friendships, resources, or opportunities based on gender stereotypic expectations constitutes unfair treatment. Intergroup contact has been shown to reduce children’s prejudicial attitudes, but less research has investigated how intergroup contact with counter-stereotypic peers shapes children’s friendship preferences. Furthermore, research indicates that children rectify inequalities for historically marginalized racial/ethnic groups. Women have historically been marginalized and excluded within science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields. Though some research has investigated the extent to which children rectify inequalities between racial groups, less research has focused on how children rectify inequalities between gender groups in stereotypic contexts, such as those involving science inequalities. The present dissertation contains three empirical papers that explore how gender stereotypic expectations shape children’s friendship preferences and distributive justice beliefs. Empirical Paper 1 explored how children’s own reported gender stereotypes and playmate experiences relate to their desires to play with peers who hold counter-stereotypic toy preferences. Empirical Paper 2 assessed children’s evaluations, resource allocation decisions, and reasoning in contexts involving inequalities of science supplies between groups of boys and girls. Empirical Paper 3 extended work from Empirical Paper 2 to investigate how children and young adults consider merit and gender group membership in science inequality contexts. Together, this body of work suggests that intergroup contact with counter-stereotypic peers can dampen the influence of gender stereotypes in shaping children’s friendship preferences, and that children and young adults maintain subtle pro-boy biases in their evaluations and decision-making regarding access to science resources between gender groups. Documenting the contextual factors that encourage children to resist gender stereotypic expectations and promote more equitable attitudes as it relates to rights to resources and opportunities can inform future research aimed at promoting inclusive orientations in childhood.

Human Development & Quantitative Methodology

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