Hiding discrimination in plain sight: The development of reasoning about disparate impact policies

Disparate impact policies are rules that are formally neutral but indirectly discriminatory: These policies marginalize protected societal groups because they focus on characteristics associated with those groups. Critically, it is often unclear whether the resulting discrimination is intentional or if a policy has a legitimate purpose. The present research tests a novel theoretical account that disparate impact policies are morally ambiguous and thus will be evaluated flexibly in response to evidence for and against intentional discrimination. We take a developmental approach to examine whether this flexibility may already be evident in early moral reasoning. In two experiments (U.S. children ages 5-12 years, total N = 232; adults, total N = 333), participants were presented with a policy that indirectly discriminated against girls: A school club only admitted children with short hair, a characteristic that is statistically uncommon among girls. Without explicit evidence as to why this policy was made, children negatively evaluated the policy starting at 7 years old, and disapproval strengthened into later childhood and adulthood. However, when provided with a strong justification for the policy (i.e., the short-hair rule prevents harm), but not a justification with circular reasoning, both children's and adults' acceptance of the policy increased. Notably, political conservatism was also related to greater acceptance among adults. Taken together, this research supports the account that people flexibly evaluate disparate impact policies in response to context, and identifies strong justifications as a lever that promotes moral acceptance of such policies across development. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).