Children growing up in divided societies, such as Israel, develop intergroup perceptions, attitudes, and behaviors that are deeply shaped by their sociopolitical context. This presentation integrates findings from three studies to explore how children perceive social group differences, form attitudes, and engage in prosocial behaviors toward outgroups, with a focus on the theoretical contributions to social identity development and intergroup relations.

The first study examined predictors of outgroup prosocial behavior among Jewish and Arab-Muslim children. Findings revealed that ingroup preference and negative outgroup attitudes mediated prosocial resource distribution across group lines. These results emphasize the developmental role of social identity processes in shaping prosocial behaviors in intergroup contexts.

The second study focused on how Jewish and Arab-Muslim children perceive differences between their groups. Thematic analysis identified cultural and religious distinctions as central to their understanding of social categories, advancing the theoretical understanding of how nuanced group categorizations influence intergroup attitudes during middle childhood.

The third study explored Arab-Christian children’s perceptions of dissimilarity and their influence on attitudes and behaviors toward Arab-Muslim and Jewish outgroups. Perceived similarity between groups was a key predictor of positive attitudes and resource allocation, with the Jewish outgroup evaluated less favorably than the Arab-Muslim outgroup. This highlights the importance of group similarity in fostering intergroup pro-sociality.

These studies provide a multidimensional perspective on the developmental and contextual factors that shape children’s intergroup perceptions and behaviors in divided societies. By emphasizing the interplay between social identity development and pro-sociality, the findings offer theoretical insights with practical implications for interventions aimed at reducing prejudice and fostering coexistence in multicultural and conflict-prone contexts.

Introduction: Gender inequalities in involvement with family life and in certain career domains (STEM, HEED) are a global phenomenon, even visible in countries with high levels of gender equality, such as the Netherlands. Parents and peers play a crucial role in children’s acquisition of gender-typical social norms and adherence to these norms. This study examined the pressure children feel to conform to gender norms (from parents, peers, and themselves) in relation to boys’ and girls’ gender-typical perspectives on future careers and family life. Children’s gender/sex and gender identity typicality were examined as moderators.

Method: 319 Dutch 8- to 12-year-old children (44.5% boys) completed self-report measures. Generalized Estimating Equations (GEE) in SPSS were used to take into account dependency between siblings.

Results: Both Dutch boys and girls tend to prioritize family over career, with girls more so than boys. Both boys and girls exhibit gender typicality in their career aspirations—boys prefer more masculine careers (e.g., football coach), while girls prefer more feminine careers (e.g., primary school teacher). Less pressure from oneself to conform to same-gender behavior was consistently related to less gender-typical career aspirations. The association between less pressure from oneself to avoid other-gender behavior and less gender-typical expectations regarding family versus career involvement was only observed among children who scored high on gender identity typicality. In contrast, among children with high gender identity typicality, less pressure from parents to conform to same-gender behavior was linked to more gender-typical career aspirations.

Implications: Parents and youth professionals can encourage a diverse range of behaviors in children, particularly those with a more gender-typical identity. This may help mitigate pressure to conform to gender norms, allowing children to realize greater career potential and explore more diverse future work-family choices.

In a cross-cultural research project, drawing on Social Identity Development Theory (Nesdale, 2004), we investigate preschoolers’ attitudes towards real and minimal groups, and their willingness to behave prosocially towards members of their own and another group. Moreover, we aim to understand how cultural differences and distinct levels of intergroup conflict shape early intergroup attitudes and prosociality. For that, we compare three countries with different social and political contexts, namely Germany, Israel, and Turkey.

The first study examines German and Israeli preschoolers’ (N = 128, Age: M = 5 years, 7 months) attitudes towards social groups and their willingness to sacrifice playtime. Preschool children indicated their attitudes towards German and Turkish and Jewish and Arab children, respectively. Next, children could forego some of their playtime to help another child from the ingroup or outgroup in a clean-up task.

In a second study, we employ minimal groups to examine fundamental differences in intergroup bias among preschoolers from Germany, Israel, and Turkey (planned N = 156, age 4 years, 10 months to 6 years, 6 months). Children indicated their attitudes towards minimal ingroup and outgroup members. In an adapted clean-up task, children could forego some playtime to help another child from the ingroup or outgroup. Finally, children could donate stickers to an ingroup and outgroup child in a resource sharing task.

For study 1, paired t-tests indicated that children preferred ingroup over outgroup members on two attitude measures, t(127) = 8.342 and t(127) = 4.639, p < .001. Differences in attitudes between countries were non-significant, Hotelling’s T²(4, 123) = 0.824, p = .512. Children did not show a bias in their actual behavior and displayed equal helping towards ingroup and outgroup members, Hotelling’s T²(2) = 0.548, p = .579. Data collection for the second study is ongoing. Preliminary findings will be presented.

A prosocial classroom climate is crucial to promote children’s wellbeing, school safety, socio-emotional wellbeing, and educational outcomes. Although it is widely acknowledged that enhancing a prosocial classroom climate is important, few evidence-based interventions exist. Hence, the current study examines the effectiveness of a school-based program promoting a prosocial classroom climate in upper primary schools, stimulated by increasing basic psychological needs and intrinsic (prosocial) motivation. The Dutch Meaningful Roles program builds on the basic psychological needs of the Self-Determination Theory, which states that learning and development are optimized when children perceive that their environment fulfills their need for autonomy, competence, and relatedness. With a cluster randomized controlled trial, we investigated whether the program was effective in increasing 1) a prosocial classroom climate, 2) intrinsic (prosocial) motivation, 3) basic psychological needs, 4) school wellbeing, 5) positive teacher attitudes, 6) civic skills, and decreasing 7) bullying and victimization. The study consisted of three assessment points, before (T1), mid (T2), and postintervention (T3). In total 42 schools participated, randomized into the experimental group (N = 20 schools, N = 1199 children) and the control group (N = 22 schools, N = 1138 children). The total sample consisted of children between 6 and 12 years (M_age = 9.6, SD = 1.20, boys 48.6%). Regression analyses for the full sample showed no significant program effects. We performed additional analyses to examine the impact of treatment integrity, by using children’s self-report data. For this subsample with ideal treatment integrity, significant program effects were observed for prosocial classroom climate, intrinsic motivation, autonomy, relatedness, and school wellbeing at T2, and competence and positive teacher attitudes at T3. These findings indicate that a classroom-based approach addressing basic psychological needs can be beneficial to promote a prosocial classroom climate. However, it is crucial that the program is implemented as intended.