The Emergence and Development of Social Group Attitudes

描述（由申请人提供）：本研究探讨幼儿对特权的态度在社会群体态度（包括社会阶级和种族态度）的发展和维持中的作用。现在有相当多的证据表明，经历和感知到的偏见和歧视会导致精神和身体健康问题（关于审查，见Mays等人，2007年）。因此，为了改善身心健康，减少群体间冲突，减少偏见和歧视符合我们的最大利益。为了达到这个目的，目前的建议探讨了一种潜在的偏见机制，即偏爱特权阶层的普遍倾向。先前的研究表明，在特定的社会群体态度出现之前（例如，Aboud, 2003），对特权的偏好在3岁之前就出现了（Olson等，2008）。为目前的假设提供进一步支持的研究发现，虽然多数群体的儿童表现出对自己种族群体的明显偏好，但早在态度出现时，少数群体的儿童就不是这样（Aboud, 1988）；相反，少数群体的孩子没有表现出偏好，甚至有轻微的亲外群体偏好。对这种不对称的一种可能解释是对社会地位的理解。多数群体儿童的社会地位和自己的群体偏好可能会趋同，而少数群体儿童的社会地位和自己的群体偏好可能会偏离，这可能导致没有种族偏好的共同结果。在这两个发现的基础上，拟议的研究验证了这一假设，即支持特权的态度与社会阶级和种族态度的发展有关，并可能促进这种态度的发展。为了验证这一假设，将进行两项研究。第一项研究采用了横断面设计来检验42至60个月大的白人和黑人儿童中亲特权、种族和社会阶级态度的出现，预测大多数儿童在最早期就会出现亲特权态度，而种族和社会阶级态度则会在更晚的时候出现。相关分析将评估亲特权态度的个体差异是否能预测种族和社会阶层态度的个体差异。下一项研究考察了5-10岁白人和黑人儿童的亲特权和种族态度之间的关系。通过调查年龄较大的儿童的这些态度，可以使用更广泛的措施，包括内隐和外显种族态度措施，评估特权偏好的问卷调查（改编自成人社会认知的工作），以及类似于研究1中使用的适合年龄的措施，以评估对特权态度和种族之间的关系。总之，这项工作将研究一个新的机制，潜在的特定社会群体的态度，对特权的普遍积极态度。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): This research investigates the role of young children's attitudes toward privilege in the development and maintenance of social group attitudes including social class and racial attitudes. There is now considerable evidence that experienced and perceived prejudice and discrimination contribute to mental and physical health problems (for a review see Mays et al., 2007). Therefore, to improve physical and mental health, as well as to reduce intergroup conflict, it is in our best interest to reduce prejudice and discrimination. Toward this end, the current proposal explores one potential mechanism underlying prejudice, a general tendency to prefer the privileged. Previous research suggests that a preference for the privileged emerges by age 3 (Olson et al., 2008), even before specific social group attitudes emerge (e.g., Aboud, 2003). Lending further support for the current hypothesis is research finding that whereas majority group children show a distinct preference for their own racial groups, as early as attitudes emerge, this is not true of minority group children (Aboud, 1988); minority group children instead show no preference or even a slight pro-outgroup preference. One possible explanation for this asymmetry is an understanding of social status. Whereas social status and own group preference are likely to converge in the case of majority group children, social status and own group preference diverge in the case of minority group children, possibly leading to the common result of no racial preference. Building on these two findings, the proposed studies test this hypothesis that pro-privileged attitudes are related to and potentially contribute to the development of social class and racial attitudes. To test this hypothesis two studies will be conducted. The first study employs a cross-sectional design to examine the emergence of pro-privileged, racial, and social class attitudes in White and Black children between the ages of 42 and 60 months, predicting that pro-privileged attitudes will be present in most children from the earliest age, whereas racial and social class attitudes will emerge later. Correlational analyses will assess whether individual differences in pro-privileged attitudes predict individual differences in racial and social class attitudes. The next study examines the relationship between pro-privileged and racial attitudes in White and Black children aged 5-10. By investigating these attitudes in older children, a wider range of measures can be used including both implicit and explicit racial attitude measures, questionnaires (adapted from work in adult social cognition) assessing the preference for the privileged, as well as age-appropriate measures similar to those used in Study 1, to assess the relationships between attitudes toward privilege and race. Together this work will examine a new mechanism underlying specific social group attitudes, a general positive attitude toward privilege. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: Decades of research have indicated that actual and perceived prejudice and discrimination are associated with reduced physical and mental health (Armstead, Lawler, Gorden, Cross, & Gibbons, 1989; Brody, et al., 2006, Harrell, Hall, & Taliaferro, 2003; Krieger, 1990; Krieger & Sidney, 1996; Szalacha, Erkut, Coll, Alarcon, Fields, & Ceder, 2003; Troxel, Matthews, Bromberger, & Sutton-Tyrrell, 2003). The current research investigates one possible mechanism underlying the development of racial and social class attitudes that contribute to prejudice and discrimination, a general preference for the privileged. If this mechanism is found to contribute to the development of social attitudes, this research will inform future intervention studies aimed at reducing prejudice before it starts in early childhood, by aiming interventions toward the underlying attitude toward the privileged, rather than the specific racial or social class attitude.