© 2007 The International Society for the Study of Behavioural Development

This study focused on the immediate effects on young children’s outgroup prejudice of peer group rejection, and the factors that might mediate such an effect. Our interest in this issue was stimulated by research indicating that, from at least as young as 5 or 6 years of age, social groups have consider-able importance to children. Indeed, according to some writers, children’s early orientation to other individuals and groups may reflect an inborn fundamental need to be accepted and to belong (Baumeister & Leary, 1995). At the least, it certainly appears that if there is the possibility of inclusion in a group, children typically seek to be included and, once included, their group, and their membership of it, becomes a central focus of their attention (Nesdale, 2004). Consistent with this view are their tendencies to like, and to see themselves as similar to, other ingroup members, by schoo