This study evaluated the efficacy of an inquiry-based poverty curriculum unit on students' beliefs about causes of poverty, economic mobility, and helping behaviors. Participants were 89 kindergarten, first-and second-grade students (mean age = 6.81 years, SD = .93) across two intervention and two control classrooms. Students in intervention classrooms participated in a 5-to 7-week curriculum unit focused on poverty. Preintervention results showed no differences in outcomes by condition. Postintervention results indicated that, compared to the control condition, students in the intervention were more likely to say that poverty is malleable over time and less likely to suggest giving money to poor families as a way to help. There were no differences, however, by condition in the types of causal attributions that students provided (i.e., individualistic, fatalistic, and structural). Implications for theory and educational practice regarding teaching about economic inequality and mobility are discussed.

In a time of unprecedented levels of income inequality, American adults support a more equitable distribution of wealth, but little is known about how children think about social stratification. This study examined children's understanding of social stratification and their evaluations of whether the stratification was fair. Participants were 5-to 8-year-old children (n ϭ 86, M age ϭ 6.81, SD ϭ .93) who were from primarily upper-middle class, racially and ethnically diverse families and attending a universityaffiliated, community-based laboratory school in Southern California. Four pictorial representations of the number of rich, poor, and middle class people in a neighborhood were used to measure children's perceptions of social stratification in their neighborhood. Whereas participants selected a range of the pictorial representations, more than half (57%) favored a majority middle class stratification and justified their choice based on concrete markers of status and their personal experiences. In addition, participants (60%) showed evidence of equity-based reasoning when evaluating the fairness of the stratification and deemed the extreme ends of the economic spectrum (i.e., majority rich) as not fair. Our findings show preliminary evidence of children's perceptions of social stratification, thus, refuting the common misconception that children are economically blind. Implications regarding the importance of parent and teacher socialization about social class are discussed. What is the significance of this article for the general public?Results from the current study suggest that when presented with a developmentally appropriate task, children (ages 5-8) are able to differentiate and evaluate the fairness of social stratification, while drawing on tangible markers of social class and equity-based reasoning to inform their decisions. In a society marked by extreme economic inequality, our results signify the importance of early conversations about social class.

Globally, children and adolescents are growing up in societies marked by stark economic inequality. Along with a robust body of scholarship highlighting the importance of economic security for children's health and well-being, researchers are beginning to examine how children and adolescents think and feel about their own and others' economic circumstances or social class position (Ruck et al., 2019). Reflecting diverse theoretical traditions, recent studies have, for example, investigated social class identity (Destin, 2019), stereotypes about the rich and poor (Sigelman, 2012), moral concerns for distributive justice (Elenbaas et al., 2020), and action for community and social change (Diemer et al., 2020). To further advance and motivate developmental intergroup perspectives on social class, in this article, we (1) define social class, (2) evaluate whether evidence about social class aligns with predictions from developmental intergroup theory (DIT) and social identity development theory (SIDT), (3) demonstrate how complementary insights from these perspectives can be integrated to advance research on social class, and ( 4) highlight what is unique about the study of social class from a developmental intergroup perspective.

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