Children's responses to social atypicality among group members - advantages of a contextualized social developmental account

Abstract

Abrams, Rutland, Palmer, Ferrell, and Pelletier (2014) showed that better second-order mental state understanding facilitates 6-7-year-olds' ability to link a partially disloyal child's atypicality to inclusive or exclusive reactions by in-group or outgroup members. This finding is interpreted in terms of predictions from the developmental subjective group dynamics model. We respond to thoughtful commentaries by Rhodes and Chalik, Patterson, and Rakoczy. Children face a significant developmental challenge in becoming able to recognize and interpret social atypicality in intergroup contexts. Researching that ability to contextualize judgements raises new questions about the nature of peer inclusion and exclusion, about children's social cognition, and about the way that social cognitive development and social experience combine. Rather than individual-focused cognition taking priority over category-based cognition, we argue the two become more systematically integrated during development. We note that loyalty is but one example of typicality, and we also consider the role of more advanced perspective taking among older children, and the role of multiple classification skill among younger children, as well as potential implications for intervention to reduce peer victimization and prejudice.