Bias Starts as Early as Preschool, but Can Be Unlearned

Young children are “astute observers of the social world,” and this can have pernicious effects on how they perceive race and gender, according to Danielle Perszyk, a psychologist at Northwestern University, and her colleagues. The majority of children in the study—both black and white—had a “strong and consistent pro-white bias.” …

These findings show that children begin to show bias from an early age. Not only do they absorb the stereotypes they see, but they also become “increasingly attuned to social category labels, social status, and the biases exhibited by family members,” explain Perszyk and her colleagues.