Black and White Children's Race-Based Information Endorsement and Teacher Preference: Effects of School and Neighborhood Racial Demographics

The current study examined whether racially minoritized children and racial majority children demonstrate different race-based learning preferences and whether the racial demographics of their schools and neighborhoods predict these preferences. Race-based information endorsement and teacher preferences of Black and White 3-to 7-year-old children (n = 238) recruited from a metropolitan area in the midwestern United States were examined. Across racially homogeneous and diverse schools, both Black and White children showed a White preference in information endorsement and teacher preference. Black and White children did not differ in their information endorsement, but they did differ in their teacher preferences: Black children chose Black teachers more than White children. Further, children overall chose the accurate adult as their teacher regardless of the adult's race, but the racial demographics of children's schools and neighborhoods related to these responses: Three-year-old children were more likely to select the accurate Black adult over the inaccurate White adult if there were more Black teachers in their schools and larger Black populations in their neighborhoods. Exploratory analyses indicated that 5-to 7-year-old White children who had non-White classroom teachers chose Black adults more than those who had White classroom teachers, but classroom teacher's race did not relate to Black children's teacher preference. The findings suggest that both microlevel factors (e.g., children's classroom teachers) and macrolevel factors (e.g., proportion of Black teachers in children's schools and Black population in their neighborhoods) could influence who children choose to learn from and prefer as teachers.