This study examined the relation of social situation variables and children's gender to children's social problem solving ability in potentially unsafe situations. A total of 62 preschoolers (mean age 4.4 years) were shown a series of four vignettes. In two vignettes, an adult or a child asked a second child to cross a street. In two other vignettes, an adult or a child asked a second child to "touch private parts." Thus the social variables in the vignettes were relative ages of social partners and the sexual or nonsexual nature of the unsafe situation. Children were asked to provide as many solutions to the social problem as they could, and their responses were categorized into strategy types. Results indicated no significant relations between age of social partners in the vignette and other variables. Children offered fewer solutions to sexual than to nonsexual dilemmas. Children offered more assertive, rule-based, and help-seeking solutions to nonsexual situations and more nonconfrontational solutions to sexual situations. Girls offered significantly more nonconfrontational solutions to sexual situations than did boys. These results suggest an impairment of preschoolers' generation of strategies in sexual problem situations. A reference list of 12 items is included. (BC)