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How do biases come about in children? Ymke de Bruijn, employed as an Assistant Professor of Interdisciplinary Social Science at Utrecht ľ�ϸ���Ӱ��, has been researching this for a number of years. “Not pointing out diversity or racism in childrearing doesn't help to reduce biases. Children already see at a very young age that there are differences between people with different ethnicities. If parents don't point this out, it becomes very confusing for children.”

Where did your interest in prejudice in children start?

Ever since my PhD research, I've been researching biases among children. Back then, I mostly looked at the development of biases: how are biases instilled in children? Which messages do parents instil? For instance, we had parents read kind of a picture book together with their children that featured characters with various cultural backgrounds. There was no text in the books, so the parents had to put their spins on the story. We were curious to see whether or not parents would point out diversity or not. We then measured biases in children to see how the parents' behaviour relates to children's opinions.

How are biases instilled in children?

Many adults seem to think that children don’t see differences between people of various ethnic backgrounds. And because of this, children cannot have biases either. The result is that some parents don’t discuss diversity or cultural differences with their children. This can be because they’re afraid that they’ll emphasise cultural differences too much and that this will result in children having biases. But research shows this is not true. Children whose parents instead point out differences more and discuss them positively, the multicultural attitude, have fewer biases.

How do you measure biases in children?

We show children photos of peers with various ethnic backgrounds, for instance white children, black children and children with Middle-Eastern/North-African appearances. We ask the children questions, such as: “Who would you like to sit next to in class the most?” and “Who would you like to invite to your birthday party?” But also negatively charged questions, such as: “Who would you not like to play with?” In one of our research projects, we asked these questions to 140 white children between six and eight years old. With the positive and inviting questions, the white children on the photos were chosen the most often and the children with Middle Eastern/North African appearances the least often. With the negative and rejecting questions, the white children on the photos were pointed out the least often.

Are there other ways in which biases are instilled in children more or less often?

A famous theory suggests that the more interethnic contact children or people have, the fewer biases they have. This doesn’t necessarily have to be contact with real children, but can also be done with stories, for instance in children's books. If children see that other children have interethnic friendships, that can reduce their biases. This seems to work both in observing friendships in real life and in reading about friendships in books. It gave me a reason to also research children's books.

What did you find during your research into children's books?

We’ve analysed a selection of 64 popular children's books from 2009-2018. In those, the first thing we saw was that people of colour were underrepresented. We've made a more in-depth analysis of a smaller selection of books, in which characters of colour had bigger roles. We didn't see very explicitly big stereotypes, like those we know from books from the 1950s. We did find some subtle patterns, which could work in stereotyping ways. Such as the hyperactive children in the class being boys of colour. In most of the books, there was little attention for the characters of colour's specific backgrounds. It looks like not only parents, but also authors of children's books sometimes have difficulties pointing out ethnic diversity and cultural differences.

It looks like not only parents, but also authors of children's books sometimes have difficulties pointing out ethnic diversity and cultural differences.

What do you hope to research in the future?

In my earlier research, I mostly focused on the instilling of biases. A future interesting subject would be: What causes some children to devote themselves to reducing social inequality? Biases are mostly about interpersonal contact. Inequality is much bigger than that. I would love to look at the positive and active sides. How can we help youngsters and children to find their voices to stand up for themselves and for others?

Which childrearing tip would you like to give to parents when it comes to diversity?

Children deal with racism and hear about it. Not talking about it provides very few little guidance in how they are to think about the subject. Parents of colour are often having more conversations about it already. But it's also important to white parents, who might think that racism or diversity don't play big roles in their children's lives. Racism and diversity are simply bigger and bigger themes in our society. Children will deal with it sooner or later. They might be witnesses of discrimination themselves, notice signs of social inequality or hear about it on television. Parents need to think very well on what kind of signals they give. Be aware that saying nothing is also a message.