Children Associate Racial Groups With Wealth: Evidence From South Africa

Abstract

Group-based social hierarchies exist in nearly every society, yet little is known about whether children understand that they exist. The present studies investigated whether 3- to 10-year-old children (N=84) in South Africa associate higher-status racial groups with higher levels of wealth, one indicator of social status. Children matched higher-value belongings with White people more often than with multiracial or Black people and with multiracial people more often than with Black people, thus showing sensitivity to the de facto racial hierarchy in their society. There were no age-related changes in children’s tendency to associate racial groups with wealth differences. The implications of these results are discussed in light of the general tendency for people to legitimize and perpetuate the status quo.

From a Different Vantage: Intergroup Attitudes Among Children from Low- and Intermediate-Status Racial Groups

“…As we alluded to earlier, both Black and Coloured participants showed clear knowledge of the wealth-related status differences that divide their two groups, matching Coloured children with wealthy items and Black children with poorer items (see also K. R. Olson et al, 2012). Furthermore, both Black and Coloured children expressed strong preferences for wealthy children over poor children, suggesting an avenue by which discrepant intergroup attitudes could form: strong associations between wealth and higher-status groups coupled with strong preferences for higher-status individuals (who tend to be members of higher-status groups).…”

“…The Coloured category also has elements of a distinct cultural heritage linked, at least in the popular imagination, to unique cultural forms (e.g., accent, traditional foods), and it has been the nexus of efforts to secure independent political representation, as well as distinct rights and restrictions during and since the Apartheid period. It is also apprehended early in development; previous research conducted in South Africa has illustrated that children as young as age four differentiate Coloured from both Black and White (K. R. Olson et al, 2012). Blacks in South Africa also stem from a variety of ethnic backgrounds, such as Xhosa and Zulu, but they are categorized by the South African state as Black and frequently self-identify as such (often in addition to ethnic or tribal affiliations).…”

“…Because past research has suggested that attitudes toward wealth may be partly constitutive of intergroup attitudes, especially among members of lower-status groups (Newheiser & Olson, 2012; in press), we developed new measures to assess (a) children's explicit preference for wealthy (vs. poor) children ("wealth liking"), and (b) the extent to which children associated Coloureds and Blacks with wealth and poverty ("wealth matching"). In the wealth liking task, modeled on a similar task with identical stimuli from prior work (K. R. Olson et al, 2012), children were presented with six trials displaying pictures of two children of the same race (i.e., two trials presented two White children, two trials presented two Black children, and two trials presented two Coloured children), along with pictures of houses and cars. The experimenter introduced the task as follows: "In this game, we're going to see some kids and the things they have.…”

“…The wealth matching task (adapted from K. R. Olson et al, 2012) probed children's stereotypical expectations regarding associations between race and wealth. Specifically, children were presented with six pairs of Coloured and Black children, together with upper-class and lower-class houses and cars.…”

“…To our eye, the most promising avenue is to interrogate children's attitudes and beliefs about wealth (e.g., Leahy, 1981Leahy, , 1983, perhaps the most visible and salient marker of status. This approach has begun to show promise in related work (Newheiser & Olson, 2012;K. R. Olson, Shutts, Kinzler, & Weisman, 2012), and we pursue it here, asking both whether and when children associate wealth with some racial groups more than others, and whether they express strong preferences in favor of the wealthy (irrespective of race).…”