Children's and Adolescents' Understanding and Experiences of Economic Inequality: An Introduction to the Special Section

The unprecedented state of economic inequality faced by many countries around the world is one of the most pressing social issues of the day, with far-reaching consequences for child and adolescent development. Despite the intensity of the public and scientific discourse on this topic, less scientific attention has been paid to young people's understanding and experiences of economic inequality, including their perceptions and beliefs about their own and others' social status and of the economic and sociopolitical contexts in which they are growing up. The collection of articles in this special section of Developmental Psychology seek to advance the theoretical and empirical knowledge base on children and adolescents' perceptions, experiences, and reasoning about economic inequality, with attention to the processes by which inequality affects developmental outcomes. Three invited commentaries provide a synthesis of the articles, offer thoughtful and insightful theoretical and methodological critiques, situate the findings in a more global context, and advance future directions for scholarship on this topic. In this introduction, the authors provide an overview of the special section and offer directions for future research.