White Dolls Research Articles

Ethnically Correct Dolls: Toying with the Race Industry

The toy industry has touted ethnically correct dolls as a progressive solution to representation and inclusion in the toy box, and in children's lives. Ethnographic work with ten‐year‐old, poor and working‐class black children in New Haven, Connecticut complicates these assertions. These children had very few ethnically correct dolls. Instead, girls had white dolls that they brought into their worlds through styling their hair in ways racially marked as black. Contrasting a case study of Mattel's Shani dolls with an ethnographic look at race and commodities among New Haven kids, this paper locates children's consumption within the context of social inequality, a context examined in few studies of toys or consumption. Taking kids as primary ethnographic subjects suggests ways in which this largely silenced group can speak to larger social and theoretical issues, among them race, class, gender, and age. [children, U.S. anthropology, social inequality, consumption]

A Cross-Cultural Examination of Racial Identity and Racial Preference of Preschool Children in the West Indies

The present study investigated the racial attitudes of preschool children in the West Indies. The Clarks' 1947 study found that both Black and White preschool children evaluate White dolls more positively than Black dolls. In this study, 302 children from four islands in the West Indies were presented with Black and White Cabbage Patch dolls. A Black female examiner instructed the children to choose a doll to play with from two dolls identical in every respect except skin coloring. The standard Clark doll questions and four more questions added by the researcher were also individually administered. In addition, 34 of the 302 children were administered a multiple-alternative method instead of the original forced-choice method only. It was found the majority (71.9%) of West Indian children when presented with Black dolls and White dolls chose to play with the White doll. The implication is that in spite of the fact that the West Indies is composed of a majority Black population, the impact of colonialism has left a debilitating effect on West Indians.

Implications of Doll Color Preferences among Black Preschool Children and White Preschool Children

Years after the "Black is beautiful" movement there remains a preference for white among Black and White preschool children. Black children have learned to reject their ethnic group as a consequence of pervasive negative stereotypes promoted by the media, teachers, parents, and the broader society. This article examined implications of previous research in 1985, which employed the Clark doll test (Clark & Clark, 1940), with the addition of a treatment intervention including learning principles of modeling, reinforcement, and color meaning word associations (Powell-Hopson, 1985). It was demonstrated that racial preferences among children could be changed at least temporarily. Pretest percentages showed that a majority of Black and White preschoolers chose a white doll when asked preference questions. In contrast, intervention posttest measurement revealed a significant percentage of preschoolers chose a black doll. We as scientists and clinicians have the tools to foster development of healthy positive self-images in youth, in particular Black children.

Racial Self‐Identification: The Effects of Social History and Gender1

Dark and Clark's pioneering study in 1947 demonstrated that Black children were ambivalent about racial self‐identification. Subsequent research indicates that during the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, Black children were increasingly likely to demonstrate a commitment to identifying with a Black stimulus. The present study investigates the extent to which this trend persists in the 1980s and how gender of the child affects her/his racial identification. The results indicate that the 1980s may be a time in history when Black children are growing more ambivalent about racial self‐identification, and that Black boys are significantly more likely than Black girls to identify with the white doll. The findings suggest that the current political climate which places Blacks at a significant social and economic disadvantage may reduce children's willingness to identify with a Black stimulus. The gender differences are explored in terms of Black boys' greater likelihood psychologically to try to identify away from Blackness.

Perceptions of Racially Related Stimuli by Young Children

The colors white and black are used as symbolic referents for, respectively, positive and negative evaluations. Studies are reviewed which describe the nature and extent of children's association of white with good and black with bad. A total of 375 white and 399 black children were tested. White and black preschool children respond similarly to the colors white and black, but white children show more polarization in their color associations than do black children. When children were filmed as they hit white or black boxes or bobo dolls with plastic baseball bats, black objects were more often the target than white objects. Preschool children's evaluative associations to the colors white and black are related to their choices of white or black playmates in a free-play situation. As child ten become older, their perceptions of the colors white and black become differentiated from their perceptions of white and black people.

Ethnic preference and identification among Canadian Indian and White children: Replication and extension.

Examined 3 hypotheses regarding ethnic preference and identification among White and Native Indian children who were asked by either a White or Native experimenter (E) to indicate their preference for either a White or Native doll, a white or brown rabbit, and a white or brown cup. The escape hypothesis suggests that both types of Ss would choose the White doll and that the Natives would show ethnic misidentification. J. E. Williams's (Williams and J. K. Morland, 1976) notion of a pro-light/anti-dark bias suggests that Ss of both races would choose the lighter of 2 objects. A 3rd hypothesis suggests that Ss of both races would choose a doll of the same race as the E; there would be no pattern regarding rabbits or cups. 30 White 5-7 yr olds and 35 Native 5-6 yr olds served as Ss. Results show that Ss of both races chose the lighter of 2 objects, consistent with Williams's hypothesis. Such responses, however, were influenced by both S's race and race of the E. Results also indicate that when choosing the doll that looked more like themselves, Ss of both races chose the White doll more frequently with a White than a Native E, a finding consistent with the E bias hypothesis. The notion that minority group Ss were attempting to escape a minority group label by identifying with objects associated with the majority group was not supported. (French abstract) (15 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2007 APA, all rights reserved)

Racial preferences and identifications of white elementary schoolchildren

The racial preferences and identifications of white children in both a white monoracial and a multiracial setting were examined. A doll selection procedure originally described by Clark and Clark (1939; 1947) to study racial awareness and preferences in black children was employed with 120 kindergarten, first, and third grade children. A majority of the children showed a marked preference for white over comparable black dolls. However, more black doll selections were made in multiracial than in monoracial schools, particularly among male subjects. White doll color preference also significantly decreased at the third grade level. This finding was consistently observed in response to each racial preference question. Neither race of the interviewer nor sex of the child had a significant effect upon doll color preferences. Few errors were made in response to a series of five racial identification questions.

Black Children's Associations of Class-Descriptive Labels

The literature is replete with descriptions of black people as culturally deprived, culturally disadvantaged, slow learners, and the like. Despite repeated use of these pejorative terms and labels, the question remains as to how blacks see themselves. In an early and classic study, Clark and Clark (1947) analyzed the genesis and development of racial identification in black children three to seven years. Their results indicated that the children clearly understood the application of and to the white dolls and brown dolls, respectively, but that the concept Negro was not so well developed (72% chose the brown doll). Only two-thirds of the children accepted the term as applicable to themselves, and approximately two-thirds of the respondents claimed they like the white dolls best (or would prefer to play with the white dolls) and that the white dolls were nice. Fifty-nine percent of the black children indicated that the colored dolls looked bad, and only 38% thought the the brown dolls were a nice color.

Racial Preferences Expressed for Peers and Adults by Preschool Children

Twenty‐four black and 24 white 4‐ to 5‐year‐old children in four child care centers were questioned with a semistructured, doll‐play interview about theirskin color preferences for peer and adult dolls. The white children chose white dolls significantly more often than black dolls on every question. Black children preferred b lack peer dolls, but showed no sig nificant difference in their choice of black or white adult dolis. The results were discussed in terms of the increasingly favorable perceptions shown by black children for others of like skin color and the implications for selection of adult role‐models.

Black and White Children's Racial Identification and Preference

Clark's and Clark's (1941) study on racial identification and preference in children was partially replicated and included a white group of children. Black and white children ranging in age from three to seven were asked to answer questions pertaining to a black doll and a white doll placed in front of them. The questions dealt with their racial identification and preference. It was found that white and Black children held a positive image of themselves and of their race. This was especially true for those Black children who own black dolls.

Age differences in racial self-identity of young black girls.

The experimenters modified the Clark and Clark doll procedure to assess racial self-identity in young black girls. The two groups of black children (3- to 4-yr.-olds and 6- to 7-yr.-olds) were shown three dolls that differed in skin color and/or hair style. They were asked which doll looked like them, which doll was prettiest, and which doll was ugliest. Although the majority of both groups identified with the black dolls, the older children displayed a more accurate racial self-identity. The children differed significantly in their perception of the ugliest doll: the younger group selected the black doll wearing an afro while the older group selected the white doll. These results were discussed in terms of the role of greater experience with blacks and whites and a possible over-reaction to the “black is beautiful” feeling on the part of the older group.

Racial Attitudes in Young White Children: A Methodological Analysis

Abstract Two new racial attitude indexes were compared to a traditional, forcedchoice method of attitude assessment, by studying 82 white kindergarten children (38 males, 44 females) from a semirural school district in southeastern Michigan. Subjects were randomly assigned to one of three groups. Group 1 was presented with storyquestions containing positive and negative evaluative adjectives, and responded by choosing either a black or a white doll; children in Group 2 chose an unimposed number of dolls from a group of five black and five white dolls in response to similar storyquestions. Group 3 subjects were administered a structured, open-ended interview in order to evaluate the way these children actively described racial stimuli. Results indicated that as permitted response latitude varied from that involved in the conventional, forced-choice technique (Group 1), through the multiple-alternative method (Group 2), to the open-ended interview (Group 3), increasingly less evidence was found for the existence of pejorative, exceptionless racial stereotypes. The different structural representations of racial attitudes revealed by the three techniques were discussed.

The Development of Racial Attitudes in Young Black and White Children

Abstract Racial attitude development was assessed in four age groups of black and white children (37 four-year-olds, 38 five-year-olds, 40 six-year-olds, and 41 seven-year-olds) through the use of a structured, open-ended interview employing black and white dolls as stimuli. The majority of statements made at each age level by both the black and the white children were meaningful, as opposed to irrelevant, and the black and white children at all age levels described both the black and white stimuli with responses that were preponderantly concrete, neutral in evaluative connotation, and nonpejorative. The method and findings of this study were contrasted with the results of racial attitude studies using forced-choice methods, and the discrepant depictions of racial attitude structure in young children found by these two methods were discussed.

An Investigation Into the Self Concepts of Lower- and Middle-Class Black and White Kindergarten Children

Theory states that the individual's conception of himself is learned from social interaction.' The responses of others to him will determine how he will perceive himself. The early childhood years are significant ones in the development of the core self concepts which are theorized to be consistent and resistant to change. The reference groups to which the individual compares himself may affect his self concept.3 The child's attitudes toward himself when he is young, may be indirectly affected by his parent's position in society. A number of studies have found that preschool black children from all parts of the country, responding to brown and white dolls (or pictures) preferred the white reference object or picture.4 A growing body of

The Doll Technique: A Measure of Racial Ethnocentrism?

With traditional measures of children's racial preference multiple requests, all presumed to measure racial preference, are made. However, children change their racial preference across the requests. Two interpretations of these changes are offered. One, suggested by Piaget, views these changes as self-contradictory and due to cognitive incapacity. The second is that children intend to express a liking for dolls of both races. The data support this latter interpretation suggesting the use of the doll technique as a measure of racial ethnocentrism. The racial preference of children, especially black children, is a continuing research interest. Clark and Clark (1947) found that black children, four through seven years of age, preferred white dolls rather than black dolls. Similar observations have been made in subsequent studies (Asher and Allen, 1969; FrenkelBrunswik, 1948; Goodman, 1952; Greenwald and Oppenheim, 1968; Landreth and Johnson, 1953; Morland, 1958, 1966; Radke et al., 1949; Radke et al., 1950; Trager and Yarrow, 1952). Others have found black children preferring black dolls (Gregor and McPherson, 1966; Hraba and Grant, 1970). Although the testing materials have varied, these studies have commonly asked children multiple questions about racial preference. For example, Hraba and Grant (1970) duplicating the Clarks' (1947) doll technique in May 1969 at Lincoln, Nebraska made four requests in regard to racial preference:' 1. Give me the doll that you want to play with. 2. Give me the doll that is a nice doll. 3. Give me the doll that looks bad. 4. Give me the doll that is a nice color. The response of the 1969 Lincoln sample to these requests is shown in Table 1. Note that the racial preferences of many respondents change with the requests. That is, many respondents (73 percent of the 1969 Lincoln sample) do not favor a doll of one race on all four requests: they do not choose a doll of one race on requests (1), (2), and (4) and a doll of the other race on request (3). Asher and Allen (1969) also note changes in racial preference across similar requests made with puppets. These changes raise a methodological question: are the four requests unidimensional as presumed, all measuring racial preference? If not, which requests measure what? This paper will investigate this phenomenon and its Table 1. The Racial Preferences of the 1969 Lincoln