Effects of adoptive status on evaluations of children

The authors examined whether being adopted or semi-adopted (born of artific ial insemination with donor sperm and genetically linked to the mother but not to the social father) is a stigmatizing attribute affecting evaluations made of a child, and whether the gender of the rater moderates the effects of adoptive status on evaluations of children. Participants included 129 u ndergraduate students from the United States who were presented with writte n scenarios describing a child's adoptive status. They were asked to evalua te the child on a number of attributes. Results showed that adoptive status did nor affect evaluations of children, although rater gender moderated th e effects of adoptive status.