Iris pigmentation and sociability in childhood: a re-examination.

Drawing from Rosenberg and Kagan's (1987) finding of an association between iris pigmentation and behavioral inhibition in early childhood, we sought, in the present investigation, to examine the developmental relation between eye color and social withdrawal in kindergarteners and children in grades 2 and 4. In kindergarten and grade 2, blue-eyed children were found to be overrepresented in groups of extremely withdrawn youngsters. No association was found between eye color and withdrawal in grade 4 or between eye color and extreme sociability at any grade. The results were interpreted as suggestive of the increasing role, with age, of social factors in the determination of extremely inhibited behavior.