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Abstract
The present research examined children’s understanding of social rank (i.e., status, power) and investigated the degree to which social rank and gender biases drive children’s evaluations of people. Study 1 examined whether children distinguish between different kinds of social rank (i.e., status, power) across early to middle childhood. Sixty-eight 5- to 10-year-olds were shown sets of characters described with status, power, or neutral rank information. Overall, children showed age-related improvements in their abilities to attribute status or power to the appropriate characters, although this improvement was especially apparent for status. Study 2 investigated whether children’s evaluations of others demonstrated a bias in favor of high status characters, gender in-group characters, or high status characters from a specific gender category (e.g., high status boys). Seventy 5- to 10-year-olds were presented with and asked questions about sets of characters that varied in status and gender (i.e., high status boy vs. low status girl; high status girl vs. low status boy). Interestingly, the combination of high status and gender in-group membership drove children’s preferences. This research was the first to examine if children perceive multiple dimensions of social rank distinctively or instead perceive social rank as a unitary concept. This involved consideration for other developmental skills and abilities that might underlie social rank conceptualization. Further, this research included other areas of children’s development (e.g., gender) to explore their potential impact on how children use social rank to guide their social decision making. Both studies have implications for why children might perceive leadership positions or other highly ranked roles as more or less suitable for themselves and other people.