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Children's subjective identification with social groups: a self-stereotyping approach
1School of Psychology, University of Dundee, Scotland. M.Bennett@Dundee.ac.uk
Developmental Science
|January 4, 2008
Summary
Children as young as five can subjectively identify with social groups, like gender. This self-stereotyping ability shows their self-conceptions change based on social context.
Area of Science:
- Social Psychology
- Developmental Psychology
- Cognitive Science
Background:
- Previous research focused on group categorization, not subjective identification.
- Self-categorization theory provides a framework for understanding subjective identification.
- Operationalizing identification as self-stereotyping is key to this research.
Purpose of the Study:
- To explore children's self-stereotyping abilities.
- To investigate subjective identification with social groups in children.
- To determine the age at which children develop subjective identification.
Main Methods:
- Two studies examined children's self-stereotyping using gender as the ingroup.
- Study 1: Children rated similarity/difference to same-sex peers after gender salience manipulation.
- Study 2: Children rated self-descriptiveness of gender-stereotypical traits under different conditions.
Main Results:
- Children showed increased similarity and decreased difference to same-sex peers when gender was salient.
- Boys, across all ages, rated ingroup-stereotypical traits as more self-characteristic when gender was salient.
- Findings suggest gender identification is present by age five and context-dependent.
Conclusions:
- Subjective identification with social groups emerges by age five.
- Children's self-conceptions are malleable and influenced by social context.
- Self-stereotyping is a valid measure of subjective social identification in children.
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