32 second-grade children were assessed on measures of sex-role preference and parental imitation. The middle-class white boys were more masculine in preference than the middle-class white girls were feminine (t = 3.43, p < .01), and lower-class black girls tended to be more mother imitative than the lower-class black boys were father imitative (r = 2.09, p < .06). No such differences were found in sex-role preference for blacks or in imitation for whites. The results indicated that there was a dominant masculine influence in the development of sex-role preference among middle-class white children and a dominant feminine influence in parental imitation among lower-class black children.
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