Abstract
AbstractThe persistence of intergroup conflicts around the world creates urgency for research on child development in such settings. Complementing what we know about internalizing and externalizing developmental outcomes, in this article, I shift the focus to children’s prosocial behaviors and more specifically, the Developmental Peacebuilding Model (DPM). The DPM makes three main contributions: It (a) integrates a developmental intergroup framework and socioecological perspective with a peace‐building paradigm to examine the target and type of children’s prosocial behavior in settings of intergroup conflict; (b) outlines how children’s outgroup prosocial behaviors, which promote constructive change at different levels of social ecology, can be understood as peace building and fostering social cohesion; and (c) has implications for research and global policy.
Highlights
Armed intergroup conflicts have both increased and intensified since the end of World War II, exposing more children to political violence
Complementing the growing body of research on the negative impact of political violence on children (Cummings, Merrilees, Taylor, & Mondi, 2017), in this article, I shift the focus to the potential constructive impact children can have on the conflict around them (McKeown & Taylor, 2017; Taylor & McKeown, 2017; Taylor, O’Driscoll, Dautel, & McKeown, 2020)
Experiencing intragroup threat predicted higher outgroup prosocial behavior a year later among adolescents in Northern Ireland (Taylor et al, 2014). These findings demonstrate the importance of specifying the target to understand children’s prosocial acts more completely
Summary
The Developmental Peacebuilding Model (DPM) of Children’s Prosocial Behaviors in Settings of Intergroup Conflict. ABSTRACT—The persistence of intergroup conflicts around the world creates urgency for research on child development in such settings. Complementing what we know about internalizing and externalizing developmental outcomes, in this article, I shift the focus to children’s prosocial behaviors and the Developmental Peacebuilding Model (DPM). Political intergroup conflicts—those based in ethnic, religious, and racial differences (Tropp, 2012)—are difficult to address. This startling reality calls for research into the cyclical nature of war and conflict and in particular, the role of children. My focus is on societies affected by conflict, the DPM has implications for the development of intergroup prosociality in other divided or diverse settings
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