analysis of the racist acts among children that were barely practiced in many schools in the US

analysis of the racist acts among children that were barely practiced in many schools in the US

This research study gives an in-depth analysis of the racist acts among children that were barely practiced in many schools in the US. To put it into perspective, the purpose of this study was basically to ascertain the race-based and non-race-based reasons for exclusions in interracial peer contexts among various children in the US. The research focused mainly on how the American participants hold prejudicial attitudes towards minority groups such as Latinos and African American children. In essence, the study went beyond and above the research that focuses on the American children’s negative traits towards others based on color to, however, a focus on how children from diverse ethnic groups or backgrounds in the US evaluate intergroup relationships in peer contexts. In a nutshell, the research aims at bringing out clearly an understating of how the target groups (minority) evaluates interracial interactions and more importantly the forms of reasoning that the minority groups use to evaluate racial exclusions as well as how often do they perceive or think that they are victims of racial discrimination.

The research study encompassed the following participants. The participants of the study entailed a sample of 685 children, all of ages 9, 12, and 15 who were in the 4^th 7^th and 10^th grades, respectively, in the US. The participants included both girls and boys, whereby the number of girls was 394 while the number of boys was 291.  More notably, the participants were attending thirteen public schools in mixed ethnicity (Native Americans and African Americans). The ethnic, racial breakdown was that the minority (African Americans, Asian Americans, Latin Americans and Biracial Americans) were 40% of the whole sample while the European Americans who were the majority had a percentage of 60%. In essence, for each ethnic group, the sample was evenly divided by gender and of great importance to note is that all the children were from the same socioeconomic bracket.

The participants were interviewed individually in a quiet room in their schools by an experienced research assistant who was basically matched with the participants by race. Moreover, pilot testing was conducted in a bid to ascertain whether the participants were well versed in the situation. Prior to interviewing all the participants, written parental consent was obtained for all children. The participant’s responses were audio-taped and later transcribed. In addition, coding was employed on participant’s justifications for their ratings using for cognitive categories, and the discrepancies as a result of the coding process were resolved through a discussion by all coders

References

Killen, M., Henning, A., Kelly, M. C., Crystal, D., & Ruck, M. (2007). Evaluations of interracial peer encounters by majority and minority US children and adolescents. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 31(5), 491-500.