Children's Perceptions of Sex Preference in Four Culture Groups

To test the hypotheses that young children do not perceive culturally determined male sex favoritism nor general cross-sex preference on the part of adults, investigators confronted samples of five-year-old and eight-year-old boys and girls from four culture groups with a story involving adults' choice of boy or girl in adoption, to which the subjects were asked to supply the ending. They were also asked to guess their own parents' choices in a similar situation and to give reasons for their responses. Both hypotheses were supported. A trend toward perception of preference for females emerged in three of the four culture groups sampled.