Journal of Cognition and Development

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Journal of Cognition and Development

ISSN: 1524-8372 (Print) 1532-7647 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/hjcd20

Beyond Discrete Categories: Studying Multiracial, Intersex, and Transgender Children Will Strengthen Basic Developmental Science

Yarrow Dunham & Kristina R. Olson

To cite this article: Yarrow Dunham & Kristina R. Olson (2016) Beyond Discrete Categories: Studying Multiracial, Intersex, and Transgender Children Will Strengthen Basic Developmental Science, Journal of Cognition and Development, 17:4, 642-665, DOI: 10.1080/15248372.2016.1195388

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/15248372.2016.1195388

Published online: 23 Sep 2016.

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Beyond Discrete Categories: Studying Multiracial, Intersex, and Transgender Children Will Strengthen Basic

Developmental Science

Yarrow Dunham

Yale University

Kristina R. Olson

University of Washington

Developmental research on social categorization has overwhelmingly focused on perceptions about and experiences of individuals who are clear or prototypical members of discrete and usually dichotomous social categories. For example, studies of social categorization, stereotyping, prejudice, and social identity have generally explored how children reason about others who are gender-typical boys or girls or monoracial White or Black children. Similarly, research participants have generally been gender-typical and monoracial. However, our efforts to build theories that account for the true range of variation require acknowledging the increasing visibility of children who do not fit into these discrete categories and raise the question of whether existing theories can capture the dynamics that arise for them. Focusing on race and gender/sex, the social categories that have received the most attention in the developmental literature, we review research that has gone beyond simple dichotomies by including multiracial, gender-nonconforming, or intersex children, either as the targets of social perception or as participants themselves. We argue that this emerging work reveals problematic assumptions built into our theories and methods and highlights the value of building a more inclusive science.

One way to reduce the dizzying complexity of the social world is to place individuals into discrete categories: Black or White, man or woman, American or foreign. We do this not only as naïve perceivers, but also as scientists. In our research focusing on social groups, for example, we routinely ask children to report their preferences for people who are Black or White or male or female (e.g., Aboud, 1988; Raabe & Beelmann, 2011); our consent forms frequently include boxes for parents to check indicating which race or gender describes their child; and we theorize about the experiences of children in these categories, thus treating each individual as an exemplar of a broader category within which we have determined they reside. This focus on discrete categories has been the foundation for much work on intergroup cognition, as well as the majority of our own work, and it has taught us many useful things. But in this article, we would like to raise the concern that it has—often unintentionally—excluded many people’s