Kids in Context

02/09/2026

New paper out now!

How do adolescents develop civic identities in deeply divided societies? We set out to explore this question in post-conflict Northern Ireland, interviewing Catholic and Protestant teens aged 12–18.

Our findings show that young people don't simply inherit political views from their families. Instead, they actively navigate competing messages from parents and peers, and this negotiation process is central to their sociopolitical development.

Crucially, we found that intergroup contact (interactions with peers from outside of their community) provides opportunities for teens to encounter competing perspectives, reflect on group-based narratives, and develop more critical, flexible understandings of the conflict. This is closely tied to sociopolitical emotional awareness, how teens interpret emotionally embedded histories, express empathy, and engage toward outgroups.

Read the full paper using the link below!

During adolescence, young people develop civic identities and the psychological and social capacities that shape how they interpret and respond to social and political issues. However, relatively lit...

22/07/2026

Kids in Context is excited share that a new paper has been accepted in Child Development! 🎉

In an experimental version of the childhood game Telephone, we asked adolescents in Northern Ireland to pass on stories about controversial topics from person to person.

What happened?
- Stories about conflict changed and lost detail much more quickly than neutral stories🗣️
- But importantly, we found little evidence that teenagers systematically made stories more favourable to their own community as they passed them on🤝

This suggests that young people may not simply reproduce the divisions they inherit. Instead, the way they communicate could help interrupt, rather than reinforce, cycles of polarised information sharing.

A hopeful reminder that the next generation may communicate about conflict differently than we often assume.

Read the paper here: https://doi.org/10.1093/chidev/aacag124

In post-conflict societies there are competing narratives between groups, like who was to blame or how to move forward. Youth can perpetuate or ameliorate

29/06/2026

Congrats to our lab group members who graduated on Saturday! 🎓

Well done to Dr Risa Rylander for completing her PhD and to Sadhbh Drummond and Elayna Watters for finishing their undergraduate Psychology degrees!

So proud of you all!🌟

27/05/2026

How do educators teach contentious topics in a post-conflict society?

Stay tuned for our new paper drawing on interviews with NI teachers to show how interpersonal pressures, school environments, and cultural contexts shape what’s possible in the classroom.

Congratulations to Dr Eva Grew for her first publication with Kids in Context, and 3rd year UG Sadhbh Drummond for her first publication of her career!

Read the abstract using this link!

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18/05/2026

New Paper!

Play doesn’t always look how adults expect.

In our new paper, Children’s Perspectives on Playfulness: A Child-Centred Qualitative Study, children describe play as joyful and immersive—but also sometimes quiet, solitary, and open-ended. They emphasise the importance of adults who support play without directing it.

These findings highlight the value of child-centred, autonomy-supportive environments across home, school, and community contexts.

This qualitative study examines children’s lived experiences of play and playfulness through interviews and creative methods with 10 children aged 8–11 in a Playwork setting. Thematic analysis identified three core themes: playfulness as an internal experience; the contextual nature of playfulne...

11/05/2026

on tour at Cognitive Development Society 2026 in Montreal, Canada!
What happens when young people pass on stories about conflict?

Dr. Jocelyn Dautel presented research finding that adolescents tend to transmit less polarized, more balanced versions of narratives over time. This points to a potential role for youth as peacebuilders in everyday communication.

05/05/2026

on tour at Cognitive Development Society 2026 in Montreal, Canada!

Emma Pitt shared our latest research on children’s reasoning about wealth and social group change.

Across a diverse sample, children viewed upward mobility as achievable—but predominantly explained it using intrinsic, effort-based accounts, with limited reference to structural influences.

These findings suggest that children’s explanatory frameworks for inequality may be shaped early and remain relatively stable across contexts.

A big thank you to the other symposium presenters for such a thoughtful and engaging session—great to be part of it.

27/04/2026

on tour at Cognitive Development Society 2026 in Montreal, Canada!

We were delighted to organise a set of talks on Why inequality persists: Children’s explanations across gender, wealth, and status at CDS 2026 in Montreal this month.

Chaired by Jocelyn Dautel and Emma Pitt, the symposium brought together four talks examining how children make sense of inequality across domains including domestic work, wealth, social mobility, and immigration.

A key theme across the session was children’s tendency to explain inequalities in intrinsic terms—focusing on individual traits or effort—rather than structural factors. Together, the talks highlighted how these early explanatory frameworks may shape children’s attitudes toward inequality, social change, and prosocial behaviour.

Huge thanks to all the symposium presenters for such a thoughtful and engaging session—really exciting to see this work advancing across multiple contexts and domains.

16/03/2026

The Kids in Context Lab is thrilled to host Jacob Glassman and eager to hear about his work in Northern Ireland, the USA, New Zealand and Israel, investigating how children in different countries think about solving large-scale conflicts between groups.👥🌍

Already he has found that children understand that a problem that's been going on for a long time might be harder to fix, but also that they would still try to help, no matter how long the conflict has lasted. We look forward to collaborating with Jacob on this work in Northern Ireland!🌟

19/02/2026

Tuning in to Misinformation Research 🎧

Earlier today, the Kids in Context team attended a talk by Mitch Dobbs, a third-year PhD student from the Psychology of Misinformation Lab at Northeastern University.

We were eager to hear about his work on the cognitive and social factors that drive belief in false information. Mitch discussed his projects which investigate how source credibility and intent shape belief updating, as well as what influences public mistrust in in institutions (e.g., the medical community and government officials) and how to remedy this.

Mitch is advised by Dr. Briony Swire-Thompson and is currently funded by an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship (NSF GRFP).

Thanks for the insightful talk, Mitch!