Developing Inclusive Youth: Promoting Intergroup Friendships and Inclusive Classrooms in Childhood

Summary

The goal of this clinical trial is to test the beneficial impacts of a web based intervention program called Developing Inclusive Youth for children in 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade. The main questions it aims to answer are:

* Does the Developing Inclusive Youth (DIY) program, which is a web-based curriculum tool with a teacher-led classroom discussion, reduce prejudicial attitudes and biases as well as increase intergroup friendships for a sample of 8 -11 year old children enrolled in 3rd , 4th, and 5th grade U.S. classrooms?
* Does the Developing Inclusive Youth (DIY) program lead to grade-related, gender-related and ethnic-related differences regarding reducing prejudicial attitudes and increasing intergroup friendships?
* Does the Developing Inclusive Youth (DIY) program change teacher attitudes regarding the malleability of prejudice, the importance of intergroup friendships, and comfort levels with discussing social inclusion and exclusion experiences in the classroom?

Student participants will take 15-20 minutes to use a Chrome notebook and headphones to access the online tool and the teacher will then lead a classroom discussion lasting 25-30 minutes. The intervention program will occur once a week for eight weeks.

The student outcome measures, given at pretest and posttest, are also assessed with Chrome notebooks while children are sitting at their desks in the classroom. The outcome measures take 25-30 minutes. Researchers will compare children in the intervention classes to children in other classes of the same grade at their school to see if the tool promotes positive peer relationships and reduces prejudice and bias.

Teacher participants will take a 25-minute online pretest and posttest survey in their classroom to assess their theories of prejudice, their awareness of their students' intergroup friendships, comfort with discussing peer social inclusion and exclusion in class, and their awareness of student experiences of exclusion.

Conditions

• Social Exclusion
• Prejudice, Racial
• Prejudice
• Sexism
• Peer Group

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

Developing Inclusive Youth (DIY)

Developing Inclusive Youth (DIY) is a web-based curriculum tool that serves as the intervention program. The animated and narrated tool displays eight peer social exclusion scenarios in a range of familiar everyday social contexts (such as the playground and school). Children enter their responses while watching the scenarios. Responses include making decisions about inclusion and exclusion, evaluating the actions as okay or not okay, attributing feelings to includers, excluders, and excluded characters, and selecting reasons that best match their justification for their decisions and evaluations. The program includes teacher-guided group discussions following use of the tool in which teachers facilitate discussions about children's interpretations of the scenarios, evaluations, reflections regarding their own experiences of exclusion, and solutions. Participants will view and discuss 8 scenarios and engage in a discussion for each one over the course of 8 weeks.

Sponsors & Collaborators

• Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD)

  collaborator NIH

• University of Maryland, College Park

  lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

• Wendy Montgomery · University of Maryland, College Park

Study Design

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Purpose

BASIC_SCIENCE

Masking

NONE

Model

PARALLEL

Eligibility

Min Age

7 Years

Max Age

12 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2022-09-27

Primary Completion

2023-12-23

Completion

2024-01-31

Countries

• United States

Study Locations