Group Norms, Threat, and Children's Racial Prejudice

• DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-8624.2005.00869.x
• Publication Date: 2005-05-13T07:52:12Z
• Authors: Drew Nesdale; Anne Maass; Kevin Durkin; Judith Griffiths
• Keywords: Male; Social Values; 150; Prejudices; White People; Reference Values; Ethnicity; Psychology; Humans; 0501 psychology and cognitive sciences; 10. No inequality; Cognitive and computational psychology; Inclusion; Social Identification; Ethnic attitudes; 05 social sciences; Australia; Exclusion; Fear; Race Relations; Social identity development theory; Child Health. Child health services; Personality Development; Attitude; 1701 Psychology; Female; Rejection, Psychology; Arousal; Prejudice

To assess predictions from social identity development theory (SIDT; Nesdale, 2004) concerning children's ethnic/racial prejudice, 197 Anglo‐Australian children ages 7 or 9 years participated in a minimal group study as a member of a team that had a norm of inclusion or exclusion. The team was threatened or not threatened by an out‐group that was of the same or different race. Consistent with SIDT, prejudice was greater when the in‐group had a norm of exclusion and there was threat from the out‐group. Norms and threat also interacted with participant age to influence ethnic attitudes, although prejudice was greatest when the in‐group had an exclusion norm and there was out‐group threat. The implications of the findings for SIDT are discussed.