The following is an excerpt of the intervention methodology. For more information, please see the full text of the article on the publisher's website or through your institution's library.

Subjects Subjects for this study were 153 children between the ages of five and nine, mean age 7.3. Of these, 22.9% were members of ethnic minority groups (12.7% black, 7.5% Oriental, 2.7% Mexican-American). The sample included 80 girls and 73 boys. All subjects were students at a public elementary school located in an upper-middle class residential area of Los Angeles.

Materials Ethnic attitudes were measured through the use of a 12-item scale [...]. For each item, the subjects were shown two full-length crayon drawings, on an 8 1/2 x 11 inch paper, of children identical except for skin and hair color. One drawing was always of a Caucasian child and the other was of either a black, Mexican-American, or Oriental child (see Figure 1). [...] Each presentation of a pair of drawings was accompanied by a story which was read to the subjects. A total of 12 different two- to three-line stories composed the ethnic attitude scale employed in the study. The scale was made up of three distinct sets of four items which were designed to assess ethnic attitudes toward blacks, Mexican-Americans, and Orientals, respectively. The stories dealt with attitudes regarding certain personal traits believed to be representative of common stereotypic conceptions of minority group members (i.e., ambition, attractiveness, responsibility, and desirability). [...]

Procedure [...] The subjects were randomly assigned to one of three groups: Group 1, the control group in which subjects were not exposed to a film; Group 2, an experimental group in which the subjects were exposed to one film; Group 3, another experimental group in which the subjects were shown two films. [...] The responses made by the subjects were rated by the experimenters on a fivepoint scale. A “1” was assigned when the subject showed no obvious sign of frustration, confusion, or hesitation in choosing the Caucasian figure in response to a positively worded item, or the minority figure for a negatively worded item. A “2” was assigned when the child showed an obvious sign of frustration or hesitation in making the same response as that given a score of “1.” A score of “3” was given when the subject was unable to choose between the two pictures, or when he/she changed his/her response. A “4” was assigned when the child hesitated, or showed frustration or confusion before choosing the minority figure for a positively worded item or the Caucasian for a negatively worded item. A score of “5” was given when the subject showed no signs of frustration, confusion, or hesitation in making the same response as that assigned a score of “4.” [...]