Child Development, September/October 2002, Volume 73, Number 5, Pages 1408–1430 Young Children’s Beliefs about the Stability of Traits: Protective Optimism? Kristi L. Lockhart, Bernard Chang, and Tyler Story Prior research has demonstrated individual differences in children’s beliefs about the stability of traits, but this focus on individuals may have masked important developmental differences. In a series of four studies, younger children (5–6 years old, Ns = 53, 32, 16, and 16, respectively) were more optimistic in their beliefs about traits than were older children (7–10 years old, Ns = 60, 32, 16, and 16, respectively) and adults (Ns = 130, 100, 48, and 48, respectively). Younger children were more likely to believe that negative traits would change in an extreme positive direction over time (Study 1) and that they could control the expression of a trait (Study 3). This was true not only for psychological traits, but also for biological traits such as missing a finger and having poor eyesight. Young children also optimistically believed that extreme positive traits would be re- tained over development (Study 2). Study 4 extended these findings to groups, and showed that young chil- dren believed that a majority of people can have above average future outcomes. All age groups made clear distinctions between the malleability of biological and psychological traits, believing negative biological traits to be less malleable than negative psychological traits and less subject to a person’s control. Hybrid traits (such as intelligence and body weight) fell midway between these two with respect to malleability. The sources of young children’s optimism and implications of this optimism for age differences in the incidence of depression are discussed. INTRODUCTION Recently there has been a re-emergence of interest in children’s beliefs about traits. Although older chil- dren are generally more adept in using trait informa- tion, even young children can use trait information to predict the future behavior of others (Gnepp & Chil- amkurti, 1988) or to make inferences about mental states (Heyman & Gelman, 1999). Much of the work in this area has focused on individual differences in beliefs about traits. For example, several studies show that possession of entity versus incremental trait be- liefs can color a child’s expectations and motivation in various scenarios (Dweck & Leggett, 1988; Hey- man & Dweck, 1998). Thus, a child who believes that traits are stable (and is therefore an entity theorist) is more likely to give up in the face of failure than one who believes that traits are malleable (and is therefore an incremental theorist). Although individual differences in beliefs about the stability of traits may predict which children are most likely to succumb to feelings of helplessness (Heyman & Dweck, 1998), young children as a whole seem relatively resilient to such feelings when com- pared with adolescents and adults. Even in the face of immediate failure, young children often predict fu- ture success (Parsons & Ruble, 1977; Rholes, Black- well, Jordan, & Walters, 1980). Similarly, young chil- dren are less likely than preadolescents and adults to expect a reoccurrence of an undesirable outcome re- sulting from negative interpersonal traits (Lockhart, 1995). Thus, young children do not think that a child who is rejected by another because he or she is “bor- ing and uninteresting” should expect rejection in the future. Kindergarten children are also more optimis- tic than are older children when predicting future positive changes in the academic competence of their peers (Droege & Stipek, 1993). Similarly, although young children are less likely to make trait-consistent predictions for future behavior than are older chil- dren, their inconsistency primarily is seen with nega- tive traits, not with positive traits (Rholes & Ruble, 1984). Dweck and Elliott (1983) have suggested that particularly in ambiguous situations, young children are likely to view their abilities as high and maintain high expectancies. Even under conditions of explicit criticism in which individual differences in helpless- ness can be found, the majority of young children still seem to believe that negative behavior is unlikely to persist into the future (Heyman, Dweck, & Cain, 1992). Overall, young children seem to be irrepress- ibly optimistic about themselves and others, becom- ing more realistic with increasing age (Schuster, Ruble, & Weinert, 1998). One explanation for this youthful optimism is that young children view traits as dispositional character- istics that, although casually potent and useful in making predictions, are not immutable over time. Adults, on the other hand, may be more likely to per- ceive traits as highly stable over long periods, believing © 2002 by the Society for Research in Child Development, Inc. All rights reserved. 0009-3920/2002/7305-0006