Children’s social wariness toward a different-race stranger relates to individual differences in temperament

When children first meet a stranger, there is great variation in how much they will approach and engage with the stranger. While individual differences in this type of behavior – called social wariness – are well-documented in temperament research, surprisingly little attention has been paid to the social groups (such as race) of the stranger and how these characteristics might influence children’s social wariness. In contrast, research on children’s social bias and interracial friendships rarely examine individual differences in temperament and how temperament might influence cross-group interactions. The current study bridges the gap across these different fields of research by examining whether the racial group of an unfamiliar peer or adult moderates the association between temperament and the social wariness that children display. Utilizing a longitudinal dataset that collected multiple measurements of children’s temperament and behaviors (including parent-reported shyness and social wariness towards unfamiliar adults and peers) across early childhood, we found that 2- to 7-year-old children with high parent-reported shyness showed greater social wariness toward a different-race stranger compared to a same-race stranger, whereas children with low parent-reported shyness did not. These results point to the importance of considering racial group membership in temperament research and the potential role that temperament might play in children’s cross-race interactions.

儿童初次遇见陌生人时，他们在接近与互动的程度方面存在显著差异。尽管关于此类行为（称为社交警惕性）的个体差异在气质研究中得到了充分记录，但令人惊讶的是，对于陌生人的社会群体（如种族）及其可能对儿童社交警惕性的影响，关注却甚少。相比之下，关于儿童社交偏见和跨种族友谊的研究，很少考察气质的个体差异以及气质可能对跨群体互动的影响。本研究通过探讨陌生同伴或成人所属的种族群体是否调节气质与儿童所展现的社交警惕性之间的关联，弥合了这些不同研究领域之间的差距。利用纵向数据集，该数据集收集了儿童在学龄前期的气质和行为（包括家长报告的害羞和针对陌生成人及同伴的社交警惕性）的多项测量，我们发现，与同种族陌生人相比，2至7岁、家长报告害羞程度较高的儿童对异种族陌生人表现出更高的社交警惕性，而害羞程度较低的儿童则没有这种差异。这些结果指向了在气质研究中考虑种族群体成员资格的重要性，以及气质可能在儿童跨种族互动中扮演的潜在角色。