Friday, March 14, 2014
The Innocence of Youth
A very interesting study published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology systematically overestimate the ages of children of color, particularly Black children, who are accused of crimes. The result is that they view them as less innocent and more culpable, and treat them more harshly.
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That seems like an interesting counter to something I'd observed anecdotally, which is that non-blacks, and especially whites, tend to *under*estimate the age of black adults. It tends to work to have a threatening effect that way too, because a young black man is scarier (faster! stronger!) than a middle-aged one, but I'd thought it was because black (and Asian) people tend to wrinkle less at the same age that the average white person is getting a lot of visible facial lines. I wish the study also had looked at how black boys' age is perceived when the viewer is NOT told that this is a little criminal. Do they still overestimate?
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