Exploring the influences of educational television and parent-child discussions on improving children's racial attitudes
Year: 2007
Type: article
Abstract: Much concern has been voiced about the development of prejudicial beliefs in \nyoung children. Previous research indicates that socializing agents such as parents and \nthe media can influence children’s development of positive and negative racial attitudes. \nLittle research has examined how parents can use educational television to introduce \ndiscussions about race with their children. Therefore, the primary purpose of this study \nwas to investigate the influences of educational television and parent-child discussions \nabout race may have on improving White children’s attitudes towards Blacks. \nNinety-three White children aged 5-7 years old and their parents participated. \nParents’ and children’s racial attitudes were tested during their first visit to a research \nlaboratory. Parents also filled out questionnaires regarding their involvement with their \nchildren’s television use and how often they engaged their children in discussions about \nrace. Families were then randomly divided into four groups: (1) a video-only group \nwhere parents were asked to screen five educational videos (provided by the researcher) \nover the course of one week; (2) a video-and-discussion group where in addition to the \nvideos, parents were given a set of topics to discuss with their children during and after \nthe screenings; (3) a discussion-only group, where parents were required to have the \ndiscussions with their children without the use of the educational videos; and (4) a control \ngroup. All families returned to the laboratory about one week later. At the follow-up \nvisit, children’s racial attitudes were reassessed. \nThree main hypotheses guided the study: (1) Children’s pre-test attitudes towards \nBlacks were expected to be influenced by their prior exposure to Black people, as well as \ntheir prior conversations with their parents about race, such that children with more \nexposure were expected to hold more positive attitudes; (2) Children who watched \nracially diverse programs and discussed the content with their parents were expected to \nshow more positive attitudes towards Blacks when comparing their post-test attitude \nscores to their pre-test scores; (3) Children in the video-and-discussion and discussiononly \ngroups were expected to be better able to predict their parents’ racial attitudes at \npost-test, compared to their own pre-test predictions and compared to children who had \nnot had such discussions with their parents. \nChildren who reported having Black friends showed slightly more positive \nevaluations of Blacks. However, neighborhood diversity was positively correlated with \nchildren’s negative evaluations of Blacks. Results revealed that parents in general were \nvery reluctant to discuss the topic of race with their children. Only 33% of mothers and \n20% of fathers reported having significant race related discussions. Many parents chose \nnot to have such discussions because they did not want to make a “big deal” out of it, \nthey did not think it was important to talk about, or they did not know how to approach \nthe topic in conversation. Parents’ and children’s racial attitudes were uncorrelated, \nindicating that children do not automatically adopt their parents’ attitudes. However, \nchildren’s perceptions of their parents’ racial attitudes were significantly correlated with \ntheir own positive and negative attitudes towards Blacks. \nIt appeared that parents were equally reluctant to talk about race even when \nspecifically instructed to do so. Close to half of parents in the two discussion groups \nadmitted that they only briefly mentioned some of the topics. Only 10% of the parents \nreported having more in-depth discussions with their children. This likely affected the \neffectiveness of the intervention, and the children in the experimental groups did not \nshow statistically significant improvements of their racial attitudes following the \nintervention. \nPrior to the intervention, many children reported that they did not know if their \nparents liked Black people or if their parents would approve of them having Black friends. \nChildren who were aware of their parents’ interracial friendships showed more positive \nand less negative evaluations of Blacks. Furthermore, children in the discussion groups \nexpressed more awareness of their parents’ racial attitudes following the intervention. \nImplications of the results of this study are discussed.
Author: Birgitte Vittrup Simpson
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W1728557802