Qualified minorities
Priming White identity elicits stereotype boost for biracial Black-White individuals
Sarah Gaither et al.
Group Processes & Intergroup Relations, forthcoming
Abstract:
Psychological threat experienced by students of negatively stereotyped groups impairs test performance. However, stereotype boost can also occur if a positively stereotyped identity is made salient. Biracial individuals, whose racial identities may be associated with both negative and positive testing abilities, have not been examined in this context. Sixty-four biracial Black-White individuals wrote about either their Black or White identity or a neutral topic and completed a verbal Graduate Record Examination (GRE) examination described as diagnostic of their abilities. White-primed participants performed significantly better than both Black-primed and control participants. Thus, biracial Black-White individuals experience stereotype boost only when their White identity is made salient.
---------------------
Two Strikes: Race and the Disciplining of Young Students
Jason Okonofua & Jennifer Eberhardt
Psychological Science, May 2015, Pages 617-624
Abstract:
There are large racial disparities in school discipline in the United States, which, for Black students, not only contribute to school failure but also can lay a path toward incarceration. Although the disparities have been well documented, the psychological mechanisms underlying them are unclear. In two experiments, we tested the hypothesis that such disparities are, in part, driven by racial stereotypes that can lead teachers to escalate their negative responses to Black students over the course of multiple interpersonal (e.g., teacher-to-student) encounters. More generally, we argue that race not only can influence how perceivers interpret a specific behavior, but also can enhance perceivers' detection of behavioral patterns across time. Finally, we discuss the theoretical and practical benefits of employing this novel approach to stereotyping across a range of real-world settings.
---------------------
Sandra Black, Kalena Cortes & Jane Arnold Lincove
American Economic Review, May 2015, Pages 604-610
Abstract:
College is a pathway to social mobility in the United States. Yet too often high-achieving students from low-income and minorities families fail to apply to selective postsecondary institutions. Our study examines the extent to which academic undermatching occurs among high-achieving minority students by analyzing the application choices of students who undergo two distinct admissions policies. We find that minority students eligible for automatic admissions and those who undergo holistic admissions are both less likely to apply to elite flagship universities than white students, despite being equally qualified based on high school performance. Instead, minorities often opt for lower tier universities.
---------------------
Race, Self-Selection, and the Job Search Process
Devah Pager & David Pedulla
American Journal of Sociology, January 2015, Pages 1005-1054
Abstract:
While existing research has documented persistent barriers facing African-American job seekers, far less research has questioned how job seekers respond to this reality. Do minorities self-select into particular segments of the labor market to avoid discrimination? Such questions have remained unanswered due to the lack of data available on the positions to which job seekers apply. Drawing on two original data sets with application-specific information, we find little evidence that blacks target or avoid particular job types. Rather, blacks cast a wider net in their search than similarly situated whites, including a greater range of occupational categories and characteristics in their pool of job applications. Additionally, we show that perceptions of discrimination are associated with increased search breadth, suggesting that broad search among African-Americans represents an adaptation to labor market discrimination. Together these findings provide novel evidence on the role of race and self-selection in the job search process.
---------------------
Tiffany Brannon, Hazel Rose Markus & Valerie Jones Taylor
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, April 2015, Pages 586-609
Abstract:
African Americans can experience a double consciousness - the two-ness of being an American and an African American. The present research hypothesized that: (a) double consciousness can function as 2 self-schemas - an independent self-schema tied to mainstream American culture and an interdependent self-schema tied to African American culture, and (b) U.S. educational settings can leverage an interdependent self-schema associated with African American culture through inclusive multicultural practices to facilitate positive academic consequences. First, a pilot experiment and Studies 1 and 2 provided evidence that double consciousness can be conceptualized as 2 self-schemas. That is, African Americans shifted their behavior (e.g., cooperation) in schema-relevant ways from more independent when primed with mainstream American culture to more interdependent when primed with African American culture. Then, Studies 3 and 4 demonstrated that incorporating African American culture within a university setting enhanced African Americans' persistence and performance on academic-relevant tasks. Finally, using the Gates Millennium Scholars dataset (Cohort 1), Study 5 conceptually replicated Studies 3 and 4 and provided support for one process that underlies the observed positive academic consequences. Specifically, Study 5 provided evidence that engagement with African American culture (e.g., involvement with cultural events/groups) on college campuses makes an interdependent self-schema more salient that increases African American students' sense of academic fit and identification, and, in turn, enhances academic performance (self-reported grades) and persistence (advanced degree enrollment in a long-term follow-up). The discussion examines double consciousness as a basic psychological phenomenon and suggests the intra- and intergroup benefits of inclusive multicultural settings.
---------------------
Timothy Diette et al.
Review of Black Political Economy, June 2015, Pages 155-177
Abstract:
The purpose of this paper is to formally evaluate whether the deleterious impact of unemployment on mental health increases as skin shade darkens for black women in the U.S. Using data drawn from the National Survey of American Life, we find strong evidence of a gradient on depression between skin shade and unemployment for black women. These findings are consistent with the premises of the emerging field of stratification economics. Moreover, the findings are robust to various definitions of skin shade. Unemployed black women with darker complexions are significantly more likely to suffer their first onset of depression than unemployed black females with lighter skin shade. While in some cases, lighter skinned black women appeared not to suffer adverse effects of unemployment compared to their employed counterparts, persons with dark complexions did not enjoy the same degree of protection from poor mental health.
---------------------
The Impact of Economic Freedom on the Black/White Income Gap
Gary Hoover, Ryan Compton & Daniel Giedeman
American Economic Review, May 2015, Pages 587-592
Abstract:
Using state-level data from 1980-2010 we examine whether economic freedom, as measured by the Economic Freedom of North America Index, has had any impact in increasing or decreasing the ratio of median income for black households to the median income of white households. To our knowledge, there has been no research on racial income disparities and the role that economic freedom might have in alleviating or exacerbating the problem. We find evidence that economic freedom is associated with an increase in the racial income gap.
---------------------
Kimberly Barsamian Kahn et al.
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, July 2015, Pages 130-138
Abstract:
This paper investigates whether within-group differences in phenotypic racial stereotypicality (i.e., extent to which individuals possess physical features typical of their racial group) of ingroup members serve as social identity contingency cues for Blacks evaluating organizations. It is hypothesized that Blacks draw information about whether their social identity would be valued based on the represented phenotypic racial stereotypicality of Black organization members. Participants viewed organizations that included high phenotypically stereotypic (HPS) Black (e.g., darker skin tones, broader facial features), low phenotypically stereotypic (LPS) Black, or only White employees. Results confirmed that Black, but not White, evaluators reported more diversity, salary, desire to work, and social identity-related trust toward the HPS, compared to LPS and White, organizations. The relationships between phenotypic racial stereotypicality condition on organizational attractiveness and diversity perceptions were mediated by identity-related trust. Results suggest considering diversity at both the group level and within group level to achieve broader benefits.
---------------------
Statistical Discrimination and the Implication of Employer-Employee Racial Matches
Yariv Fadlon
Journal of Labor Research, June 2015, Pages 232-248
Abstract:
In this paper, I test the empirical validity of a statistical discrimination model that incorporates employer's race. I argue that if an employer statistically discriminates less against an employee that shares the same race (matched) than an employee who does not share the same race (mismatched), then the correlation between the employee's wage and his skill level (AFQT) is stronger for a matched employee than for a mismatched employee. Using data from the NLSY97, which includes information about the racial background of employees and their supervisors, I find evidence that is consistent with a statistical discrimination model for young male employees.
---------------------
Capturing the cardiac effects of racial discrimination: Do the effects "keep going"?
Lori Hoggard et al.
International Journal of Psychophysiology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Racial discrimination negatively impacts cardiac functioning, but few studies examine the more distal cardiac effects of racial discrimination experiences. The present study examined the momentary and prolonged impact of lab-based intergroup and intragroup racial discrimination on heart rate variability (HRV) and heart rate (HR) in a sample (N = 42) of African American (AA) women across two days. On day one, the women were exposed to simulated racial discrimination from either a European American (EA) or AA confederate in the lab. On day two, the women returned to the lab for additional physiological recording and debriefing. Women insulted by the EA confederate exhibited lower HRV on day one and marginally lower HRV on day two. These women also exhibited marginally higher HR on day two. The HRV and HR effects on day two were not mediated by differences in perseveration about the stressor. The findings indicate that racial discrimination - particularly intergroup racial discrimination - may have both momentary and prolonged effects on cardiac activity in AAs.
---------------------
Stereotype validation: The effects of activating negative stereotypes after intellectual performance
Jason Clark et al.
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, April 2015, Pages 531-552
Abstract:
With regard to intellectual performance, a large body of research has shown that stigmatized group members may perform more poorly when negative, self-relevant stereotypes become activated prior to a task. However, no research to date has identified the potential ramifications of stereotype activation that happens after - rather than before - a person has finished performing. Six studies examined how postperformance stereotype salience may increase the certainty individuals have in evaluations of their own performance. In the current research, the accessibility of gender or racial stereotypes was manipulated after participants completed either a difficult math test (Studies 1-5) or a test of child-care knowledge (Study 6). Consistent with predictions, stereotype activation was found to increase the certainty that women (Studies 1, 2, 4, and 5), African Americans (Study 3), and men (Study 6) had toward negative evaluations of their own test performance. These effects emerged when performance-related perceptions were stereotype consistent rather than inconsistent (Studies 1-6) and were found to be most pronounced among those who were highly identified with the stereotyped group (Study 5). Furthermore, greater certainty - triggered by negative stereotypes - predicted lowered domain-relevant beliefs (Studies 1, 2, 3, and 6) and differential exposure to domain-relevant stimuli (Studies 4 and 5).
---------------------
Race, Friends, and College Readiness: Evidence from the High School Longitudinal Study
Steven Elias Alvarado & Brian An
Race and Social Problems, June 2015, Pages 150-167
Abstract:
Close friends are likely to transmit influence on students' educational attitudes and decisions that are independent of students' own background abilities and motivations. However, previous research suggests that close friends may have uneven effects on educational outcomes by race and ethnicity. We analyze the impact of close friends who are college bound on students' college readiness using new and restricted panel data from the High School Longitudinal Study (2009-2011). Descriptive analyses suggest that having a college-bound friend is positively associated with college readiness and that these impacts are felt by racial and ethnic subgroups in separate and unique ways. Results from propensity score models suggest that while having a college-bound friend generally yields positive effects on all students, it has a more consistent effect on white students' college readiness compared with Asians, blacks, and Latinos. A formal sensitivity analysis suggests that these treatment effects are robust to the confounding influence of an unobserved confounder.
---------------------
Dynamics of the Black-White Gap in Academic Achievement
Ian McDonough
Economics of Education Review, August 2015, Pages 17-33
Abstract:
The black-white test score gap remains a measurable phenomenon in the United States. Up to this point the literature has primarily focused on the black-white achievement gap without taking into account the underlying mobility patterns of individual students as they progress from one grade to the next. However, the degree to which policy makers and educators should be concerned about the black-white test score gap should be tied to how mobile the two groups of students are through the distribution of test scores from one grade to the next. In this paper I apply two nonparametric estimators of distributional mobility to data on test scores and track black-white differences in mobility across the entire distribution of achievement. When compared to whites, blacks tend to be less upwardly mobile and more downwardly mobile for both math and reading. This pattern is particularly prominent for reading in the very early years of schooling.
---------------------
Geoffrey Ho & Miguel Unzueta
Journal of Applied Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Previous research has found that people high in social dominance orientation (i.e., antiegalitarians) generally oppose affirmative action policies. We propose that antiegalitarians may be less opposed to strong affirmative action policies because such policies may be perceived to ultimately strengthen racial hierarchies. Studies 1 and 2 demonstrate that antiegalitarian individuals are less opposed to affirmative action policies, as compared to egalitarian individuals, when such policies strongly weigh minority status in selection decisions. Study 3 provides evidence that antiegalitarians lessen their opposition to strong policies only when such policies are believed to enhance racial hierarchies through the recruitment of minorities that remain at the bottom of organizational hierarchies. Theoretical, political, and organizational implications are discussed.
---------------------
Brenda Hannon
Hispanic Journal of Behavioral Sciences, May 2015, Pages 204-222
Abstract:
This study uncovers which learning (epistemic belief of learning), socioeconomic background (level of parental education, family income) or social-personality factors (performance-avoidance goals, test anxiety) mitigate the ethnic gap in SAT (Scholastic Assessment Test) scores. Measures assessing achievement motivation, test anxiety, socioeconomic family background, and epistemic belief of learning were administered to 143 European American and 62 Hispanic students. ANCOVA revealed that the measures of epistemic belief of learning, performance-avoidance goals, and level of parental education each had a unique influence on combined SAT (SAT-V + SAT-M), SAT-V (verbal SAT), and SAT-M (math SAT) scores. Indeed, the statistical removal of these influences resulted in the elimination of 55% to 75% of the effect attributed to ethnic differences in SAT performance. Moreover, even when gender differences were controlled, ANCOVA revealed the same results. Taken as a whole, these results suggest that multiple factors influence ethnic differences in SAT performance.