The role of intergroup biases in children's endorsement of information about novel individuals

A great body of evidence suggests that children are remarkably selective in accepting information from different sources. Yet, very few studies have focused on children's learning about the attributes of others. In three experiments, we examined how 6- and 7-year-olds' ingroup and outgroup biases about novel target individuals and their biases to follow ingroup informants interact in social learning contexts. Overall, children exhibited a positivity bias, accepting positive testimony about ingroup and outgroup targets, but this bias was significantly higher for ingroup targets. Furthermore, whereas children accepted the positive testimony about ingroup targets regardless of the informant's group membership, children selectively relied on ingroup informants when endorsing information about outgroup targets. These results suggest that children's existing biases interact with their acquisition of knowledge in complex ways and shape their social evaluations. These findings may have important implications for developing strategies to prevent negative biases against outgroup individuals among children. (C) 2018 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.