Study: Black Girls Are Viewed As 'Less Innocent' Than White Girls

Source: Caffa.org

The report found that adults view young black girls as less innocent and more adult-like than white girls starting as young as five-years-old.

Conducted by Georgetown Law's Center on Poverty and Inequality, "Girlhood Interrupted: The Erasure of Black Girls' Childhood" is the first of its kind to focus on girls (back in 2014 a report was released that focused on young black boys which discovered that, unlike their white counterparts, black boys are viewed as older and suspected of crimes starting at age 10). The way society perceives black youth ultimately leads to their "adultification" which the report defines as a phenomenon "which effectively reduces or removes the consideration of childhood as a mediating factor in Black youths' behavior."

READ: The Composure Of Black Children In The Face Of Police Instability

According to those that participated in the report, black girls need less nurturing and protection, as well as need to be supported and comforted less than young white girls. The report also found that participants assumed black girls know more about adult topics and sex.

Most of the adults surveyed had a high school diploma or higher but those facilitating the report found the biggest differences in the ways adults view children in the age brackets 5-9 and 10-14. The report also does a good job of contextualizing how this phenomenon has its roots in America's racist history, highlighting how black femininity was defined in three ways in the south during slavery (Sapphire, Jezebel, and Mammy).

READ: Black Students Who Have At Least One Black Teacher Are More Likely To Graduate

From there, the report also discusses how adult perceptions have a "casual connection" to why black girls are disciplined more harshly than their peers in school and beyond, with black almost three times more likely than white girls to be referred to the juvenile justice system and 20 percent more likely to be charged with a crime.

"The consequences of entering the juvenile justice system can't be ignored," Rebecca Epstein, one of the researchers for the report, said in an interview with HuffPost. "As we know, it can change the course of a girl's life. But despite these startling statistics, there's precious little research about why this different treatment happens; why are black girls subjected to more discipline and greater contact with the juvenile justice system? And at the center, we wanted to look at those possible root causes."

Check out the report here.