Ways in which children learn about race and form attitudes towards groups other than their own are described and the processes underlying the development of racial awareness and racial attitudes are delineated. The first three sections of the paper discuss the age at which racial attitudes begin to form, the developmental antecedents of racial attitudes from infancy through age 3 years, and the measurement and meaning of racial awareness. The major portion of the document discusses various social and psychological factors underlying the development of racial attitudes. The factors discussed include direct instruction, reinforcement, personality characteristics of parents and children, child rearing techniques, cognitive aspects and perceptual components of racial attitudes, socialization, and the relative salience of racial cues in contrast to other cues such as gender and age. The concluding section of the paper explores parallels between the acquisition of racial and other attitudes and offers a conceptualization of racial attitude development involving eight overlapping steps through which children progress during the first 10 years of life. (Author/RH)