How Two Intuitive Theories Shape the Development of Social Categorization

Social categorization provides a valuable mechanism for explaining and predicting human behavior, yet also contributes to the development of social stereotyping and prejudice. Thus, understanding how social categorization develops is critical for both cognitive and social development. This article presents a theoretical perspective on the development of social categorization— that children map intuitive theories about the structure of the social world onto categories they encounter in their environment. In particular, 2 intuitive theories—that social categories are natural kinds and that social categories mark people who are obligated to one another—are described as shaping the acquisition of social categories. The article discusses implications for how children explain, predict, and interact with their environment. KEYWORDS—social categorization; folk theories; social cognition From early infancy, children have countless experiences with human behaviors and human variation. Classifying people into categories (e.g., girls, doctors, babies) is a crucial way of organizing these experiences. Social categorization enables children to encode and retrieve information about people efficiently and provides a valuable mechanism for predicting and explaining human action (for review, see Kinzler, Shutts, & Correll, 2010). Yet, social categorization also contributes to a range of negative psychological and social phenomena, including social stereotyping and prejudiced attitudes (Bigler & Liben, 2007; Rutland, Killen, & Abrams, 2010). Thus, social categorization is critical to our understanding of both cognitive and social development, and provides insight into important connections between these fields. This article outlines a theoretical perspective on this intriguing and socially important area. Categories reflect domain-specific intuitive theories about the structure of the world (Murphy & Medin, 1985). For example, given the many ways that animals could be categorized (fur color, size, location, behavior), the decision to classify into species kinds (e.g., dogs vs. cats) reflects abstract beliefs about the structure of the biological world—that the biological world is composed of discrete kinds that are determined by biological inheritance (Atran, 1998). Thus, to describe the development of social categorization, it is necessary to identify the nature of children’s theories about the structure of the social world. This article describes two intuitive theories of the social world—that social categories are natural kinds and that social categories mark patterns of social obligations—and examines the role of each in shaping the development of social categorization across