Allison P. Anoll, Vanderbilt University

“From Protest to Childrearing: How Movement Politics Shape Socialization Priorities.”

While social science often locates social movement effects in short-term policy outcomes, we
argue movements may have longer-term effects by altering adults' beliefs about child socializa-
tion. We use the Summer 2020 Black Lives Matter protests to study Whites' race socialization
preferences. Several tests point to BLM's capacity to shape agendas and provide information
potentially changing Whites' childrearing preferences. Posts on Facebook parenting groups
and pages show increased posting about race, racism, and diversity in Summer 2020. Survey
data indicate many White parents of school-aged White children engaged in race socializing
actions for the first time following the BLM protests and attributed their choice to move-
ment activity. An experiment shows that priming BLM reactivates socialization priorities
nearly two years after the protests' height. Our work helps explain how social movements
can alter the political landscape in both the near- and long-term and opens a new avenue for
researching movement effectiveness.

Personal Website