• What is ethnic identity/identification?
• When do children first notice race?
• History of ethnic identity research.
• Current models of ethnic identity development.
• Implications of ethnic identity development.

• In children:
• Ability to identify one’s own and others’ racial or ethnic group.
• The understanding that racial and ethnic categories do not change.
• Racial preferences.
• In adolescents:
• Beliefs and attitudes related to membership in a particular racial or ethnic group.

• Around 3 or 4
• Earlier for members of racial minorities
• Earlier for those in mixed-race settings
• Earlier for those with explicit race socialization
• Recognition of own race occurs before correct labeling of others

• Survey of attitudes
• Preferences for pictures or drawings
• Choice of dolls
• Thematic Apperception Test
• Analysis of social interaction
• Measures of autonomic changes

• Ruth and Eugene Horowitz
• 1939 Ruth Horowitz conducted landmark study on wishful thinking in Black boys
• Eugene Horowitz thought other-group preference was healthy

• Kenneth & Mamie Clark
• 1939a Kenneth & Mamie Clark used similar methodology; added skin color
• 1939b those in integrated settings identified as White more often
• 1950 tested racial preferences (or wishful thinking)

• Independent Variables
• School Type (segregated vs. integrated)
• Sex, skin color, age
• Dependent Variable
• Race preference, categorization, self-identification
• Give me the doll that:
• you like to play with, is a nice doll, looks bad, is a nice color
• looks White, looks colored, looks Negro,
• looks like you

• Children had clear knowledge of racial differences
• Appropriately self-identified
• Had preference for White skin
• Older children preferred brown skin
• Preference for White strongest in integrated school

• Many more doll-type studies with similar results.
• Studies have shown self-esteem is not affected by negative attitudes.
• More attention to the role of cognitive development.

• Based on theories of social perspective-taking — self develops within context of social relationships
• Can be extended to any racial or ethnic group

• Level 0 (3-6): Integration of affective and perceptual understanding of ethnicity
• Attitudes develop before identification
• Attitudes unrelated to parents’ attitudes
• Unrelated to attitudes of friends
• At societal level

• Level 1 (6-10): Literal understanding of ethnicity
• Ethnicity is customs, ancestry, language
• Still very literal
• Concrete Operations
• Cognitive flexibility increases

• Level 2 (10-14): Social perspective of ethnicity
• Reflects social understanding of ethnicity.
• Understand subtle aspects of ethnicity such as SES differences.
• Suggest interpersonal interactions are based on ethnicity.
• Understand how others respond to and treat members of different ethnic groups.

• Level 3 (adolescent): Ethnic-group consciousness and ethnic identity.
• Active search for "truth".
• Development of group consciousness.

• Policy.
• Mental Health.
• Self-esteem.
• Friendship choice and play patterns.
• Later ethnic identity.
• Prejudice and discrimination.
• interventions.

• Cross, W.E. (1992). Shades of Black. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.
• Hirschfeld, L.A. (1995). How young children perceive race. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
• Quintana, S.M. (1998). Children’s developmental understanding of ethnicity and race. Applied and Preventive Psychology, 7, 27-45.

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