We firmly believe that through a richer understanding of how children develop social group concepts and their implications for intergroup attitudes, we can also devise better interventions for remedying hazardous intergroup behaviors. Thus, in our lab, we attempt to translate some of our insights to the field, in the form of educational programs or more localized interventions.

Due to the more complex logistics of conducting field studies, we often team up with NGOs that have more established connections with communities and schools, and together we implement our programs. Two such examples are work we have done -- and are currently doing -- with the aChord Center (https://www.achord.org.il/en) and  Games for the Future (https://www.g4f.co.il/). With these two organizations, for instance, we have introduced Persona Dolls (depicted in the banner for this field) into Jewish kindergartens, and are currently launching a similar project in Arab kindergartens.

For some of our recent studies in this field, check out these papers:

Nassir, Y., & Diesendruck, G. (2024). Priming group identities affects children's resource distribution among groups. Child Development, 95(2), 409-427.

Nasie, M., Ziv, M., & Diesendruck, G. (2022). Promoting positive intergroup attitudes using persona dolls: A vicarious contact intervention program in Israeli kindergartens. Group Processes & Intergroup Relations, 25(5), 1269-1294.

Liu, R., Diesendruck, G., & Xu, F. (2023). Changing children’s intergroup biases through statistical counterevidence. In Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society (Vol. 45, No. 45).