Exclude posts from children categories with query_posts/get_posts

In theory, if your ‘active category’ is a category parent, and you want to exclude posts from the children, then you would get NO posts displayed, because the parent category should not be assigned to a post–only the lowest/deepest child in the hierarchy should be checked.

If both the parent and child categories are assigned to posts, then this should work to return ‘Category ID 6 only’ posts:

query_posts(array('category__in' => array(6)));

Hello,
Post from my children/grandchildren categories are showing up in the parent categories and ordered by date. So they will show up before
the current categories post if published later. I don not have each category checked in the post, just the appropriate one.

I just want the current categories post to take precedence. So
House cat has a post, its children/grandchildren have posts. If on the parent ‘House’ category that post should show first.

I am now using the code listed above but like so:

$cat_posts->query(array('category__in' => array($cat),'posts_per_page'=>1,'order'=>DESC));

I now cant have previous links for the subcategory articles though. Is this the completely wrong way to handle a category-based theme.

Thank you for any insight.

Thanks, MDR21, and MichaelH.
It works for me. I can now list all of a parent category’s posts, then display a list of subcategories underneath.
https://prilisauer.eu/category/lebensmittelverpackung/

Still working on getting the list of subcats nice and purdy.

<div class="content_container">
		<h1 class="first">Produkte in aktueller Kategorie:</h1>
		<?php query_posts(array('category__in' => array($cat))); ?>
		<?php if ( have_posts() ) : while ( have_posts() ) : the_post(); ?>
		<div class="zwei_drittel"><div class="image_medium"><a href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>"><div class="image_medium_border"></div><?php postimage_special(300,140); ?></a></div></div>
		<div class="ein_drittel"><h2 class="notoppadding"><a href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>"><?php the_title(); ?></a></h2><?php the_excerpt(); ?></div><div class="clear"></div>
		<?php endwhile; else: ?><p>index.php | nichts gefunden</p><?php endif; ?>

		<?php
		$this_category = get_category($cat);
		// If this category contains children
		if (get_category_children($this_category->cat_ID) != "") {
			echo '<h1 class="first">Unterkategorien</h1>';
			echo '<ul>';
	wp_list_categories('hide_empty=0&title_li=&orderby=term_order&child_of='.$this_category->cat_ID);
			echo '</ul>';
		} ?>

	</div>