Adults and Children Blatantly Dehumanize Outgroups

Abstract

Dehumanization is observed in adults across cultures and is thought to motivate the worst forms of human violence. The age of first expression and the degree of socialization required to foster dehumanization remains largely untested. Here we show that several different representations of humanness, including a novel one, readily elicit blatant dehumanization in adults and children (5-12 years of age). We also find that dehumanizing responses in both age groups are associated with stronger perception of outgroup inferiority and a willingness to punish outgroup transgressions. Results rule out the need for exposure to cultural norms throughout adolescents and adulthood before observing significant outgroup dehumanization. We argue these findings provide support for the hypothesis that dehumanization emerges with theory of mind abilities in early childhood rather than resulting from a more general-purpose mechanism that is a by-product of adult abilities for metaphorical reasoning and social learning.

Dehumanization: trends, insights, and challenges

“…Overt blatant dehumanization has now been observed across a number of domains, including in American political partisans' attitudes toward the other party [61][62][63], alt-right adherents' attitudes towards a wide range of minority groups [64], attitudes toward Asian-Americans during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic [65,66], and even among young children considering hypothetical outgroups [67]. A growing body of research further considers targets' experience of feeling blatantly dehumanized, finding that such meta-dehumanization can contribute to vicious cycles of intergroup hostility (Box 1).…”