Adults view black girls as 'less innocent,' new report says

[Tennis]

(CNN)When compared with their white peers, young black girls are viewed less as children and more like adults, according to a new research report.
Adults in the United States tend to view black girls as "less innocent" and more grown up than white girls, according to the report, which published by Georgetown Law's Center on Poverty and Inequality on Tuesday.
Based on those findings, the research suggests that adults may perceive that black girls need less nurturing and protection than white girls, which could influence how black girls are treated in the education or juvenile justice systems.

"If our public systems, such as schools and the juvenile justice system, view black girls as older and less innocent, they may be targeted for unfair treatment in ways that effectively erase their childhood," said Rebecca Epstein, lead author of the report and executive director of the Center on Poverty and Inequality.

She added that disparities in how black girls are viewed emerge as early as age 5, when some children are still in preschool.
"Our finding that adultification begins as young as the age of 5 was particularly sobering. That means that adults may even see little girls in kindergarten differently, needing less nurturing and support than their white peers," Epstein said.
"Yet at the same time, the more general confirmation that black girls are adultified was not surprising. Scholars and researchers have observed this phenomenon for years," she said. "Many experts have observed that stereotypes of black women, especially the stereotype of the 'angry black woman,' are projected onto black girls, and that black girls' behavior is often interpreted as threatening to adults' authority, which effectively adultifies black girls in harmful ways."

For the report, 325 adults of various racial and ethnic backgrounds from across the United States were asked to complete a nine-item questionnaire online about their perceptions on young girls' development today. The participants were recruited through an online service in order to obtain a diverse, community sample of adults, the researchers wrote in their report.
The adults were randomly assigned questionnaires specifically about either black or white girls, not in relation to each other or racial groups. The survey collection started in December and continued over a few months into this year.
The questionnaire included questions like "How much do black (or white) females seem older than their age?" and "How much do black (or white) females need to be comforted?" and "How knowledgeable are black (or white) females about sex?"
For each question, the adults responded using a five-point scale to indicate one - "not at all;" two - "a little;" three - "undecided;" four - "somewhat;" and five - "a great deal." The adults responded to each question for each age bracket of 0 to 4, 5 to 9, 10 to 14, and 15 to 19 years old.

Even though the online questionnaire responses were self-reports, the respondents were unaware that their responses about black or white girls would be compared with the other race. Therefore, that lowered the risk of respondents hiding their own biases and skewing the data, said Jamilia Blake, associate professor of educational psychology at Texas A&M University and a co-author of the new report.

The researchers found that, overall, the adults were more likely to view black girls as more adult than white girls at almost all stages of childhood beginning around age 5, which Blake said shocked her.
"To me, this is work that's very close to my heart," she said. "I think that the negative stereotypes about black women are so pervasive that we are not aware of them and I think we are seeing this trickling down to girls."


Black girls were more likely to be perceived as knowing more about adult topics, such as sex, and were more likely to be perceived as needing less protection and nurturing, according to the survey results.
"This is the first study to focus on black girls and measure this form of bias against them. It provides important proof that adults view black girls differently than white girls in ways that can significantly affect their lives and long-term outcomes," Epstein said.
"Our research did not explore why black girls are viewed as less innocent," she said. "However, it seems clear that a part of the legacy of slavery and race and gender discrimination in this country is that we have not extended the same leniency to black children as white children."

Girls feel less 'smart' than boys by age 6, research says
The researchers modeled their survey and five-point scale after the methodology used in a separate study that published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology in 2014.

In that previous study, a separate research team focused on the plight of black boys and found that overall black boys were perceived by the adults who were surveyed as less innocent and more adult-like than their white peers, starting around age 10.
"In everyday life, how folks across races adultify or identify black girls as older, from the mall to the school classroom, can be biased in recognizing the support that they need and the reality that they experience," said R. L'Heureux Lewis-McCoy, an associate professor of sociology in Colin Powell School for Civic and Global Leadership and the Black Studies Program at the City College of New York, who was not involved in the new report.

"What I would like to see is if the scholars who produced this survey brought these questions to police officers or teachers, who have a lot of contact with black girls, and see if responses would be different," he said about the new report.

It turns out that, even though black boys face higher rates of school discipline than other students on average, the racial disparities seen in school discipline are even greater for black girls, according to a study that was published in the journal Sociology of Education in February. Perry was a co-author of that study.
"We speculate that racial disparities in discipline are greater for girls than for boys because black girls are especially susceptible to punishment for gendered transgressions," Perry said.

"In other words, behavior perceived as violating norms of femininity -- fighting, disruptive behavior, disobedience, wearing particular kinds of clothing -- is more likely to be noticed and punished in girls," she said. "This is consistent with the 'boys will be boys' attitude toward masculinity and boys' behavior. This gender pattern intersects with race, which is where our research and the Georgetown report converge."
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Perry, who was not involved in the Georgetown report, said that the report "rings true" and described the methodology as "sound." She hopes that all Americans can use the findings to reflect on their own potential biases, she said.
"Most people are unaware of their own racial and gender biases, which makes it more difficult to address them. Racism and sexism operate through subtle everyday interactions, behaviors, decisions, and evaluations that ultimately have large cumulative effects on the wellbeing and life chances of girls and women of color," Perry said.

"Racism and sexism are also built into our laws and institutions in ways that are largely imperceptible to the average person," she said. "As a society and as individuals, we need to confront the issue of race, not pretend we are colorblind. This means bringing hidden biases to the forefront of both a national discussion and interpersonal interactions with the people in our lives."

Really depressing story here.

http://www.cnn.com/2017/06/28/health...udy/index.html

It shows why we need to ensure that there is diversity in the workplace and in hollywood and basically everywhere. It shows why we need affirmative action. It shows why we all need to do our part.

Hopefully this thread isn't closed as it is a top story and very important to discuss.

[Zethras]

Definitely going to get closed, it's about gender AND race.

Cmon tennis, you know better.

[Shadee]

CNN so it's probably fake news

[Seranthor]

Really depressing story here.

http://www.cnn.com/2017/06/28/health...udy/index.html

It shows why we need to ensure that there is diversity in the workplace and in hollywood and basically everywhere. It shows why we need affirmative action. It shows why we all need to do our part.

Hopefully this thread isn't closed as it is a top story and very important to discuss.

Gender thread, Race thread, Why do you knowingly ignore the rules, which of the moderators are you, or which one do you have in your pocket?

[Tennis]

Definitely going to get closed, it's about gender AND race.

Cmon tennis, you know better.

It's one of the top stories on the CNN. Definitely worthy of discussion imo. Plus globals said that not all threads on these topics should be closed.

[Zethras]

It's one of the top stories on the CNN. Definitely worthy of discussion imo. Plus globals said that not all threads on these topics should be closed.

Only yours, Tennis.

[Deleted]

Gender thread, Race thread, Why do you knowingly ignore the rules, which of the moderators are you, or which one do you have in your pocket?

Possibly because he/she believes in freedom of speech and doesn't give a damn what some anal hall monitor thinks.

[Thanatoss]

Possibly because he/she believes in freedom of speech and doesn't give a damn what some anal hall monitor thinks.

Last time I checked the government wasn't closing threads because reasons so I don't see how its a freedom of speech issue

[Tennis]

Gender thread, Race thread, Why do you knowingly ignore the rules, which of the moderators are you, or which one do you have in your pocket?

Uh dude gonna respond to the thread and the article or derail with backseat moderating?

[Zethras]

Gender thread, Race thread, Why do you knowingly ignore the rules, which of the moderators are you, or which one do you have in your pocket?

Probably Endus.

[Seranthor]

Possibly because he/she believes in freedom of speech and doesn't give a damn what some anal hall monitor thinks.

So the rules are anal? Is that your claim?

[BannedForViews]

Really depressing story here.

http://www.cnn.com/2017/06/28/health...udy/index.html

It shows why we need to ensure that there is diversity in the workplace and in hollywood and basically everywhere. It shows why we need affirmative action. It shows why we all need to do our part.

Hopefully this thread isn't closed as it is a top story and very important to discuss.

You could not be more of a troll.

[Underverse]

She added that disparities in how black girls are viewed emerge as early as age 5, when some children are still in preschool.

Why not before 5? Clearly it's not just the color of their skin.

I bet adults also view asian girls as more innocent. This is what happens when you have clear differences in facial and body structure between ethnic/racial groups.

[Seranthor]

Uh dude gonna respond to the thread and the article or derail with backseat moderating?

You bemoan the perception that they are less innocent. I see it as a result of the lack of parental supervision and a lack of parental interest, so they are forced to become more mature quicker. When parents dont learn responsibility as a child they dont know it when they become parents themselves and the cycle continues, which comes from abdicating one's responsibilities to the government.

So uh dude, its a parent problem.

- - - Updated - - -

Probably Endus.

Kind of my thought.

[Tennis]

You bemoan the perception that they are less innocent. I see it as a result of the lack of parental supervision and a lack of parental interest, so they are forced to become more mature quicker. When parents dont learn responsibility as a child they dont know it when they become parents themselves and the cycle continues, which comes from abdicating one's responsibilities to the government.

So uh dude, its a parent problem.

- - - Updated - - -



Kind of my thought.

How is it a parent problem? It's a social problem you mean.

These girls could be from any neighbourhood. They could be the daughters of lawyers, doctors, sports stars and yet they're just considered to be less innocent? That is not acceptable in today's world.

[Deleted]

ok so? why does it matter??

[Seranthor]

How is it a parent problem? It's a social problem you mean.

These girls could be from any neighbourhood. They could be the daughters of lawyers, doctors, sports stars and yet they're just considered to be less innocent? That is not acceptable in today's world.

To adequately discuss this you have to step into forbidden topics like race and gender. Which unlike you apparently, we dont have moderators to look the other way when we violate the rules.

You got as much as I'm comfortable discussing. I said what I meant, I meant what I said. If I had thought it was a social problem I would have said that.

[Underverse]

How is it a parent problem? It's a social problem you mean.

These girls could be from any neighbourhood. They could be the daughters of lawyers, doctors, sports stars and yet they're just considered to be less innocent? That is not acceptable in today's world.

Women are also considered less innocent than men. Is this a great injustice?

Why are you placing so much value on innocence? It's has virtue as a means of creating protective emotions in others but people are also less likely to take you seriously.

[Tennis]

Women are also considered less innocent than men. Is this a great injustice?

Why are you placing so much value on innocence? It's has virtue as a means of creating protective emotions in others but people are also less likely to take you seriously.

Women are? Where are you getting that info from exactly?

Uhh it matters. We should view everyone the same. We should not just cast steryotypes on people. Would you like if someone thought that white males were more likely to be pedos? I've seen articles saying as much you know.

[Seranthor]

Women are? Where are you getting that info from exactly?

Uhh it matters. We should view everyone the same. We should not just cast steryotypes on people. Would you like if someone thought that white males were more likely to be pedos? I've seen articles saying as much you know.

But YOU dont view everyone the same... No one does, we ALL have prejudices... yes, even YOU.