Exploring Children’s Evaluations of Inclusion and Exclusion

to depictions of white and black individuals. Results indicated that children's assumptions about skin colour aligned with their age and developmental abilities, including physical conservation, comprehension of physical casualty, and the conservation of social identity.

According to Katz (1976) and Clark et al (1980), a child's attitudes towards people should follow the same developmental rules as their attitudes towards other stimuli. Katz (1976) argues that the process of acquiring racial attitudes is similar to forming other attitudes, but it must not be separated from ongoing internal processes. The child's socialization within a society where racist attitudes are present is the cause of their development. Racism is a product of social processes and institutional structures, not an individual tendency to categorize. Clark, Hocevar & Dembo (1980) demonstrate that social cognition can explain the decrease in pro-white bias when interacting with a black examiner, but they find it challenging to explain the increase in pro-white bias between ages three and six. Clark et al (1980) note that other researchers have reported similar effects using various measures of racial attitudes.

According to Killen (2007) children do not use a single stage, like Kohlberg’s pre-conventional stage, to judge social events and transgressions. Instead, they use simultaneous reasoning forms such as moral, conventional or psychological methods. Killen’s (2007) study shows that decisions to exclude others are based on a wide range of factors including group norms, stereotypic expectations, and fairness assessments. Empirical research on intergroup exclusion indicates that children use different schemes to evaluate various intergroup scenarios and problems, which means that some decisions are related to age, like Martin’s (1989) study, while others are not.According to Killen (2007) in her study,

the majority of students (95%) believed that it was unjust to exclude one of their peers from a group solely based on their gender or race. The study included an example of a ballet club not allowing a boy to join simply because he is male, or a baseball club not accepting a girl because she is female, as shown in Figure 3 on page 33.The research conducted on peer-group music settings targeted at gender and race revealed that the children showed a tendency to use less moral reasoning while assessing exclusion. The study included questions about how they would perceive a girl who wished to join a boys' music club or if a black student wanted to be part of a white students' musical group. It was observed that several students used social-conventional reasons for justifying exclusion, such as their belief that the female black student wouldn't fit in with the group's music preferences. Martin (1989) had earlier noted that gender stereotypes can be regarded as organized knowledge structures made up of an interconnected network of associations (p.34).

The use of associative networks in information-scarce situations helps to predict information about others. Even in situations where little is known about someone, children tend to make stereotypical judgments based on their gender. Gender is an important factor in our culture, making it a common basis for making judgments. Forming impressions of others involves integrating various types of information into overall judgments, as noted by Martin (1989). Children are capable of using three types of gender-related information: the first is related to a person's sex, the second involves sex-typed interests, behaviors, or appearance, and the third

refers to labels such as "tomboy" and "sissy", given to children who engage in cross-sex behavior or cross-sex dressing.

(p. 81). In 1989, Martin conducted a study that compared the toy preferences predicted by younger and older children for a target based on gender-related information. The hypothesis was that masculine sex-typed toys would be of more interest to male targets, while feminine sex-typed toys would be preferred by female targets over masculine ones. The expectation was that younger children would make social judgments based more on gender categories than specific gender-related information.

The research consisted of choosing 72 children from day-care and after-school care facilities, primarily from middle-class families of Caucasian descent. The findings revealed that younger participants exhibited more disapproval towards tomboys compared to other targets, while older participants displayed a stronger aversion towards sissies than any other targets. (p.)

According to the study, children's identification of masculine and feminine interests is influenced by the target's gender regardless of age. However, analyzing Martin's findings proved challenging since each group included different age ranges. The younger group comprised kids aged between three and a half to six years old while the older one consisted of those aged from six and a half to ten years old.

Understanding the results proved to be a difficult task due to the considerable variation in children's reactions within each group. The preferences of the target were disregarded, as these youngsters assumed that masculine toys were for boys and feminine toys for girls. It is noteworthy that young children are "gender-centric" and lack differentiation skills within gender groups. Martin (1989) suggests that they rely on generalized rules such as "all boys like

trucks" rather than acknowledging that some or most boys may enjoy other types of toys. This indicates that their rigid views on gender could hinder them from utilizing information related to distinguishing between boys who prefer stereotypical "boy" toys versus those who favor typically "girl" ones.

86). When making complex judgments, children are able to use certain types of information over others. While young children cannot use interests in this way, they are able to rely on counter-stereotypic labels. However, they only use these labels in their own assessments of how much they like someone and not when predicting how much others will like them. A study by Martin (1989) found that younger children will ignore individuating information that contradicts their expectations for gender and instead focus on the sex of the target.

In essence, younger kids view gender groups as identical while older kids become better at considering relevant information about others' interests (p. 87). This implies that children around seven or eight years old can start recognizing differences between boys and girls.

The research shows that when only gender information is available, there is an increasing tendency to make differentiated judgments about the sexes. As noted by Berk (2006) children, particularly as they age, assert that individual traits like dress, hairstyle, diary records, and friendships are not subject to control by authority figures and are solely within the province of the individual (p. 408).

Various factors, including child rearing practices, schooling, peer interaction, and culture, influence children's moral reasoning. According to Berk (2006), children whose parents listen sensitively, ask clarifying questions, and demonstrate higher levels of reasoning learn the most about moral development. On the

other hand, younger individuals whose parents lecture, use threatening ways or make sarcastic remarks experience little or no change in their moral reasoning abilities.

When evaluating children's evaluations of inclusion and exclusion related to racial and gender theories, some challenges and implications arise. The studies of moral, social-conventional, and personal reasoning that coexist in these contexts have revealed certain undercurrents. For instance, Martin (1989) found that results had less reliance on gender categories when other relevant information was available to use.

To study racial attitude changes among three to six year-olds, future investigators must incorporate cognitive ability measures that are sensitive to developmental differences between these age groups and the assessment strategies young children employ.

Katz (1976) identified that the research on racial prejudice and its recent theories were often inconclusive and methodologically problematic, indicating similar barriers. (pp. 332). To address this, Katz suggested that there should be more focus on the normal developmental context of racial attitude acquisition, recognizing its complexity. As children develop, they expand the breadth of their stereotypic knowledge, making highly differentiated judgments about sexes when only gender category data is available. As a result, children’s intergroup biases affect their judgments of exclusion.

It is important to intervene in childhood to address stereotyping as it is hard to change this behavior in adults. Understanding why children resort to stereotypic expectations is crucial in creating effective interventions and reducing prejudice behaviors. Source: Berk, L. E. (2006). Development through the lifespan (4th ed.).

The source of this information can be found in a book by Allyn & Bacon, published in Boston and New York, specifically on pages 405-409.The article titled "The Role of Cognitive Development in Children’s

Explanations and Preferences for Skin Colour" was published in Developmental Psychology, Volume 6, Issue 4, in 1980 by Clark, A, Hocevar, D, and Dembo, M.

Katz, P. A. (1976) discovered how children develop racial attitudes from 332 to 339.

Killen, M. appears in Towards the elimination of racism edited by Katz, P. A. and published by Pergamon Press in New York.

(2007). Kohlberg's study titled "Children's Social and Moral Reasoning About Exclusion" was published in Child Development volume 16, issue 1, pages 32-36.

Volume 2 of "Essays on Moral Development: The Psychology of Moral Development - The Nature and Validity of Moral Stages" was published by Harper ; Row in San Francisco.

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Martin, C. L. (1989). Children’s Use of Gender-Related Information in Making Social Judgements: Developmental Psychology: Vol . 25, No.

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