Ethnic habitus and young children: a case study of Northern Ireland

Connolly, Paul; Kelly, Berni; Smith, Alan

doi:10.1080/13502930902951460

Cited by 42 publications

(37 citation statements)

References 13 publications

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“…Instead, the pattern is one of micro-segregation such that in urban settings entirely Catholic neighborhoods can abut entirely Protestant ones (see Lloyd & Shuttleworth, 2012). Consistent with this pattern of segregation, there is evidence that children begin to internalize the ethnic-religious symbols and culture of their respective community from three years of age; by age six they already personally identify with their own community and show prejudice (Connolly, 2011;Connolly, Kelly & Smith, 2009;Connolly, Smith & Kelly, 2002).…”

Section: The Current Study: Religion Categories In Northern Irelandmentioning

confidence: 98%

Development of essentialist thinking about religion categories in Northern Ireland (and the United States).

Smyth¹,

Feeney²,

Eidson³

et al. 2017

Developmental Psychology

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Social essentialism, the belief that members of certain social categories share unobservable properties, licenses expectations that those categories are natural and a good basis for inference.A challenge for cognitive developmental theory is to give an account of how children come to develop essentialist beliefs about socially important categories. Previous evidence from Israel suggests that kindergarteners selectively engage in essentialist reasoning about culturally salient (ethnicity) categories, and that this is attenuated among children in integrated schools. In five studies (N=718) we used forced-choice (Study 1) and unconstrained (Studies 2-4) categorybased inference tasks, and a questionnaire (Study 5) to study the development of essentialist reasoning about religion categories in Northern Ireland (Studies 1-3 & 5) and the US (Study 4).Results show that, as in Israel, Northern Irish children selectively engage in essentialist reasoning about culturally salient (religion) categories, and that such reasoning is attenuated among children in integrated schools. However, the development trajectory of essentialist thinking and the patterns of attenuation among children attending integrated schools in Northern Ireland differ from the Israeli case. Meta-analysis confirmed this claim and ruled out an alternative explanation of the results based on community diversity. Although the Northern Irish and Israeli case studies illustrate that children develop selective essentialist beliefs about socially important categories, and that these beliefs are impacted by educational context, the differences between them emphasize the importance of historical, cultural, and political context in understanding conceptual development, and suggest that there may be more than one developmental route to social essentialism. Development of essentialist thinking about religion categories in Northern Ireland (and the United States)Psychological essentialism is the belief that natural categories contain an underlying essence that conveys category membership and causes category members to share both observable and hidden properties (Gelman, 2003;Medin & Ortony, 1989). In some cases, essentialist thinking can be useful. For example, using "essentialized" categories for inference provides us with an important tool to reduce the complexity of incoming information to manageable levels, and allows us to organize what we know and make inferences about what we don't know. However, essentialist thinking can also be harmful and lead to overgeneralization or unwarranted assumptions of homogeneity, especially when essentialist thinking is applied to social categories (e.g. Diesendruck, 2013;Leslie, Cimpian, Meyer & Freeland, 2015). In this paper we examine the development of essentialist thinking about socially important religion categoriesCatholic and Protestant-in Northern Ireland, with particular attention toward how school and national context may contribute to differences in the use of social categories to guide inferences.Essentialist...

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Section: The Current Study: Religion Categories In Northern Irelandmentioning

confidence: 98%

Development of essentialist thinking about religion categories in Northern Ireland (and the United States).

Smyth¹,

Feeney²,

Eidson³

et al. 2017

Developmental Psychology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Many times the category of 'minority children' is perceived to be homogeneous whereas the operative assumption of multicultural practices is usually that minority children are not in any particular need of developing inter-and transcultural sensitivities or of dismantling racist stereotypes, by virtue of being minorities. Findings such as these point to the need for education to promote (all) children's awareness of and respect of diversity early on (Connolly et al, 2009). At the same time, teachers need to encourage, rather than deter, children's development of positive, reflective and critically examined cultural identities that may operate as buffers to phenomena of discrimination and facilitate children's ability to connect with others (Banks, 2001).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

I’ll race you to the top: Othering from within - attitudes among Pontian children in Cyprus towards other immigrant classmates

Theodorou

2011

Childhood

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Drawing on data from a larger ethnographic study, this article explores processes of othering among immigrant children of different ethnic and racial backgrounds at a public elementary school in Cyprus. Immigrant children of Pontian background internalized and reproduced racial and Eurocentric stereotypes against their non-European immigrant classmates, despite the shared experience of marginalization by the Greek-Cypriot majority. Such examinations of children's negotiations of selfing and othering widen our understandings of how children make meaning of, are influenced by but also shape their worlds, and carry implications for the anthropology of childhood and intercultural education.

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“…It is not that his inner world is only a product of psycho-biographical influences (such as insecure attachments) and life-cycle transitions: it also a matter of wider, societal and cultural conditioning (Robinson, 2007). It is axiomatic that children are socialized by families, peer groups and institutions and by way of their class and ethnic positions (Connolly et al, 2009). This can result in a habitus which privileges education as a route to a better future.…”

Section: Implications For Child and Family Social Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Towards a critical ecology of child development in social work: aligning the theories of Bronfenbrenner and Bourdieu

Houston

2017

Families, Relationships and Societies

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Bronfenbrenner’s model of bio-ecological development has been utilised widely within the social sciences, in the field of human development, and in social work. Yet, while championing the rights of marginalised families and communities, Bronfenbrenner had under-theorised the role of power, agency and structure in shaping the ‘person–context’ interrelationship, life opportunities and social wellbeing. To respond to this deficit, this article first outlines Bronfenbrenner’s ‘person, process, context and time’ model. It then seeks to loosely align aspects of Bronfenbrenner’s model with Bourdieu’s analytical categories of habitus, field and capital. It is argued that these latter categories enable social workers to develop a critical ecology of child development, taking account of power and the interplay between agency and structure. The implications of the alignment for child and family social work are considered in the final section.

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Ethnic habitus and young children: a case study of Northern Ireland

Cited by 42 publications

References 13 publications

Development of essentialist thinking about religion categories in Northern Ireland (and the United States).

Development of essentialist thinking about religion categories in Northern Ireland (and the United States).

I’ll race you to the top: Othering from within - attitudes among Pontian children in Cyprus towards other immigrant classmates

Towards a critical ecology of child development in social work: aligning the theories of Bronfenbrenner and Bourdieu

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