Black, White, and Red All Over
How Exposure to the Confederate Flag Affects Willingness to Vote for Barack Obama
Joyce Ehrlinger et al.
Political Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Leading up to the 2008 U.S. election, pundits wondered whether Whites, particularly in Southern states, were ready to vote for a Black president. The present paper explores how a common Southern symbol - the Confederate flag - impacted willingness to vote for Barack Obama. We predicted that exposure to the Confederate flag would activate negativity toward Blacks and result in lowered willingness to vote for Obama. As predicted, participants primed with the Confederate flag reported less willingness to vote for Obama than those primed with a neutral symbol. The flag did not affect willingness to vote for White candidates. In a second study, participants primed with the Confederate flag evaluated a hypothetical Black target more negatively than controls. These results suggest that exposure to the Confederate flag results in more negative judgments of Black targets. As such, the prevalence of this flag in the South may have contributed to a reticence for some to vote for Obama because of his race.
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Revisiting the Obama Effect: Exposure to Obama Reduces Implicit Prejudice
Corey Columb & Ashby Plant
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
The present research experimentally evaluated whether exposure to Barack Obama, a positive counter-stereotypic exemplar, can result in a decrease in implicit anti-Black prejudice among non-Black participants. In order to undo any existing influence of exposure to Obama, we first exposed some participants to negative Black exemplars. Participants were assigned to one of three conditions where they were exposed subtly to negative Black exemplars, to negative Black exemplars and then Obama, or to neutral X's (i.e., control). Participants who were only primed with negative Black exemplars showed more implicit negativity toward Black people compared to the control group. Participants exposed to the same negative Black exemplars and then Obama showed a decrease in implicit racial bias levels compared to those in the negative exemplar only condition, providing experimental evidence that exposure to Obama can decrease implicit racial bias levels. These findings indicate that even subtle exposure to a positive, counterstereotypic exemplar can reduce implicit prejudice.
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Laurie O'Brien, Donna Garcia, Christian Crandall & Justin Kordys
British Journal of Social Psychology, December 2010, Pages 895-903
Abstract:
We focused on a powerful objection to affirmative action - that affirmative action harms its intended beneficiaries by undermining their self-esteem. We tested whether White Americans would raise the harm to beneficiaries objection particularly when it is in their group interest. When led to believe that affirmative action harmed Whites, participants endorsed the harm to beneficiaries objection more than when led to believe that affirmative action did not harm Whites. Endorsement of a merit-based objection to affirmative action did not differ as a function of the policy's impact on Whites. White Americans used a concern for the intended beneficiaries of affirmative action in a way that seems to further the interest of their own group.
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Stigmatized and Dominant Cultural Groups Differentially Interpret Positive Feedback
Jason Lawrence, Jennifer Crocker & Hart Blanton
Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, January 2011, Pages 165-169
Abstract:
Members of stigmatized cultural groups may view positive feedback from a dominant group member more negatively than do dominant cultural group members. In this experiment, a White evaluator praised or did not praise either Black or White students for a good academic performance. The students then indicated their perceptions of the evaluator's politeness and performance expectations and their feelings about their performance. Praised Black students rated the evaluator as less polite than did nonpraised Black students, whereas praise did not affect the White students' evaluations of the evaluator's politeness. Black students tended to attribute praise to the evaluator's low expectations, whereas the White students tended to attribute praise to high expectations. The Black students also felt better about their performance than did the White students. The discussion raises additional questions for future research.
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The People Doth Protest Too Much: Explaining Away Subtle Racism
Landon Reid & Kristen Birchard
Journal of Language and Social Psychology, December 2010, Pages 478-490
Abstract:
The present study examined whether the length of an individual's written explanation for an instance of subtle, attributionally ambiguous racism related to their perception of racism, levels of prejudice, and social dominance orientation. Individuals (n = 51) read a brief vignette describing an instance of subtle racism and then wrote a description explaining what they believed was happening in the situation. Individuals higher in prejudice and social dominance orientation wrote longer situational explanations. Individuals who wrote longer situational explanations were less likely to perceive the situation as racist and more likely to attribute that situation to a chance happening. Finally, longer explanations also contained more situational attributions unrelated to race. As the number of attributions unrelated to race increased, the perception of racism decreased. The present results suggest that longer explanations helped individuals explain away subtle racism.
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The Slave Trade and the Origins of Mistrust in Africa
Nathan Nunn & Leonard Wantchekon
American Economic Review, forthcoming
Abstract:
We show that current differences in trust levels within Africa can be traced back to the trans-Atlantic and Indian Ocean slave trades. Combining contemporary individual-level survey data with historic data on slave shipments by ethnic group, we find that individuals whose ancestors were heavily raided during the slave trade are less trusting today. Evidence from a variety of identification strategies suggest that the relationship is causal. Examining causal mechanisms, we show that most of the impact of the slave trade is through factors that are internal to the individual, such as cultural norms, beliefs, and values.
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Roland Fryer & Glenn Loury
NBER Working Paper, December 2010
Abstract:
Affirmative action policies are practiced around the world. This paper explores the welfare economics of such policies. A model is proposed where heterogeneous agents, distinguished by skill level and social identity, compete for positions in a hierarchy. The problem of designing an efficient policy to raise the status in this competition of a disadvantaged identity group is considered. We show that: (i) when agent identity is fully visible and contractible (sightedness), efficient policy grants preferred access to positions, but offers no direct assistance for acquiring skills; and, (ii) when identity is not contractible (blindness), efficient policy provides universal subsidies when the fraction of the disadvantaged group at the development margin is larger then their mean (across positions) share at the assignment margin.
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Race to College: The "Reverse Gap"
William Mangino
Race and Social Problems, December 2010, Pages 164-178
Abstract:
This article uses the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health to establish that once socioeconomic status is considered, black Americans go to college at higher rates than whites. The outcome replicates numerous other studies that use different datasets and varying methods. Combining statistics and literature, I propose that blacks' superior educational investment is an "empirical generalization." This leads to discussions of the black-white "gap" in education and the "attitude-achievement paradox." The latter claims that black people have high educational aspirations but fail to act on those attitudes. But when considering the choice to invest in education, the "attitude-achievement paradox" evaporates. Black Americans have high educational aspirations and, when there are enough resources, act on those aspirations by going to college at higher rates than whites. The paper concludes with a theoretical explanation of why black people, more than whites, efficiently translate resources into educational investment. I use literature to show that in the United States, the bearers of light skin are afforded numerous informal opportunities that allow them to get higher returns out of a given level of human capital. Non-whites, on the other hand, have fewer informal opportunities, and they therefore deploy "supra-normal efforts" of skill acquisition as a strategy to overcome their informal disadvantage.
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Brigitte Vittrup & George Holden
Analyses of Social Issues and Public Policy, forthcoming
Abstract:
The purpose of this study was to test the potential of educational television and parent-child discussions about race to change White children's attitudes toward Blacks. Ninety-three White children ages 5-7 and their parents participated. Families were randomly assigned into three experimental groups and one control group. Those in the experimental groups were asked either to show their children five educational videos, with or without additional discussions, or to have race-related discussions with their children without the videos. Improvements were seen in children's out-group attitudes in both the video and discussion groups, whereas in-group attitudes decreased for those who watched videos and had discussions with their parents. Results revealed lack of parental compliance. Even when instructed to do so, only 10% of parents reported having in-depth race-related discussions with their children. Children's racial attitudes were not significantly correlated with those of their parents, but children's perceptions of their parents' attitudes were positively correlated with their own. Reasons for parents' reticence about race discussions, their outcome implications, and directions for future research and intervention are discussed.
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Remarriage, Delayed Marriage, and Black/White Intermarriage, 1968-1995
Vincent Kang Fu
Population Research and Policy Review, October 2010, Pages 687-713
Abstract:
How have changes in marriage order and marriage timing affected 1968-1995 trends in United States Black/White intermarriage? Researchers usually follow a one-sex perspective on the effects of timing and marriage order on marital selection, arguing that delayed marriages and remarriages will be more heterogamous than early or first marriages. This paper shows that a one-sex perspective is oversimplified and that assortative marriage with respect to race depends on the interaction of both husband's and wife's characteristics. Marriages that match with respect to age or marriage order tend to also match with respect to race. First marriages and remarriages for both partners are more likely to be same-race marriages. Marriages that are intermarriages with respect to marriage order are more likely to also be intermarriages with respect to race. Marriages that are usual age combinations (husband and wife similar in age or husband slightly older) are also usual race combinations (husband and wife same race). Marriages that are unusual age combinations are more likely to be racial intermarriages. This paper also shows that trends in remarriage patterns do not account for the increasing trend in racial intermarriage and that trends in marriage timing have actually slowed increases in racial intermarriage.
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Vincent Hutchings, Hanes Walton & Andrea Benjamin
Journal of Politics, October 2010, Pages 1175-1188
Abstract:
Researchers have argued that explicit racial appeals are rejected in contemporary American politics because they are perceived as violating the norm of racial equality. We test this claim with an experimental design, embedded in a representative survey of Georgia where, until recently, the state flag featured the Confederate battle emblem. In our experiment, we manipulate the salience of racial cues in news accounts of the state flag controversy in Georgia. We hypothesize that women are more likely than men to reject explicit racial appeals. We focus on the effects of explicit messages in two areas: support for Confederate symbols and identification with the Democratic Party. As hypothesized, when the racial significance of this debate is made explicit support for the Confederate flag declines, but only among women. Similarly, explicit appeals lead to lower levels of Democratic identification among men, but among women the effects are weaker and less consistent.
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Chung-li Wu
Journal of Black Studies, November 2010, Pages 225-242
Abstract:
This study examines the impact of political empowerment on employment opportunities in the private sector for African Americans. It is hypothesized that African Americans' success in capturing local elective office leads to an increase in their employment in the private sector; therefore the biracial (Black-White) differences in employment allocation in the private work force should tend to decrease. The research employs multivariate regressions to evaluate five explanations for biracial dissimilarity in employment in 240 primary metropolitan statistical areas. The findings reveal that the effects of empowerment are considerably less of an influence than expected on improving African Americans' employment. Viewed in this light, African Americans have been overly optimistic about how political power can improve economic conditions.
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Narrowly Tailored Actuarial Models for Affirmative Action in Higher Education
Evelyn Maeder & Richard Wiener
Analyses of Social Issues and Public Policy, December 2010, Pages 116-145
Abstract:
Previous research discusses the superiority of actuarial models over clinical models in a number of areas related to accuracy and consistency in decision making. The current project sought to develop an actuarial candidate selection model for affirmative action in higher education that would achieve the goal of diversity by assigning points for a number of diversity-related characteristics in addition to standard academic admission criteria. Two experiments showed that participants who used actuarial models selected applicants with more markers of academic success and greater diversity using factors favored by recent U.S. Supreme Court cases. The second experiment showed that an unweighted actuarial model also helped decision makers select more minority student candidates and that it produced higher ratings of procedural fairness. The article discusses how an actuarial model might pass Constitutional muster in light of recent Supreme Court cases.
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Stereotype threat and college academic performance: A latent variables approach
Jayanti Owens & Douglas Massey
Social Science Research, January 2011, Pages 150-166
Abstract:
Stereotype threat theory has gained experimental and survey-based support in helping explain the academic underperformance of minority students at selective colleges and universities. Stereotype threat theory states that minority students underperform because of pressures created by negative stereotypes about their racial group. Past survey-based studies, however, are characterized by methodological inefficiencies and potential biases: key theoretical constructs have only been measured using summed indicators and predicted relationships modeled using ordinary least squares. Using the National Longitudinal Survey of Freshman, this study overcomes previous methodological shortcomings by developing a latent construct model of stereotype threat. Theoretical constructs and equations are estimated simultaneously from multiple indicators, yielding a more reliable, valid, and parsimonious test of key propositions. Findings additionally support the view that social stigma can indeed have strong negative effects on the academic performance of pejoratively stereotyped racial-minority group members, not only in laboratory settings, but also in the real world.
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Beyond and Below Racial Homophily: ERG Models of a Friendship Network Documented on Facebook
Andreas Wimmer & Kevin Lewis
American Journal of Sociology, September 2010, Pages 583-642
Abstract:
A notable feature of U.S. social networks is their high degree of racial homogeneity, which is often attributed to racial homophily-the preference for associating with individuals of the same racial background. The authors unpack racial homogeneity using a theoretical framework that distinguishes between various tie formation mechanisms and their effects on the racial composition of networks, exponential random graph modeling that can disentangle these mechanisms empirically, and a rich new data set based on the Facebook pages of a cohort of college students. They first show that racial homogeneity results not only from racial homophily proper but also from homophily among coethnics of the same racial background and from balancing mechanisms such as the tendency to reciprocate friendships or to befriend the friends of friends, which both amplify the homogeneity effects of homophily. Then, they put the importance of racial homophily further into perspective by comparing its effects to those of other mechanisms of tie formation. Balancing, propinquity based on coresidence, and homophily regarding nonracial categories (e.g., students from "elite" backgrounds or those from particular states) all influence the tie formation process more than does racial homophily.
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The company you keep: Fear of rejection in intergroup interaction
Jenessa Shapiro, Matthew Baldwin, Amy Williams & Sophie Trawalter
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, January 2011, Pages 221-227
Abstract:
People use many cues to infer the likelihood of acceptance or rejection in intergroup interactions. Nearly all prior research has focused on personal cues directly given off by the potential interaction partner (e.g., eye contact, smiling). However, we argue that in the context of intergroup interactions, individuals may be especially sensitive to broader social cues, such as an interaction partner's social network. Across three experiments we explored differences in White participants' evaluations of a smiling Black man presented with a Black or White friend. When this Black man was featured with a Black friend, White participants reported greater rejection concerns and a greater inclination to reject this Black man compared to when he was featured with a White friend (Experiments 1-3) or featured alone (Experiment 2). Furthermore, when participants received a simple intervention designed to buffer against social rejection, the race of the Black man's friend no longer influenced participants' interests in befriending the Black man (Experiment 3). This research demonstrates the power of friendships in interracial interactions and provides evidence for a simple intervention to reduce the weight of rejection concerns in interracial interactions.
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Identifying Provider Prejudice in Healthcare
Amitabh Chandra & Douglas Staiger
NBER Working Paper, September 2010
Abstract:
We use simple economic insights to develop a framework for distinguishing between prejudice and statistical discrimination using observational data. We focus our inquiry on the enormous literature in healthcare where treatment disparities by race and gender are not explained by access, preferences, or severity. But treatment disparities, by themselves, cannot distinguish between two competing views of provider behavior. Physicians may consciously or unconsciously withhold treatment from minority groups despite similar benefits (prejudice) or because race and gender are associated with lower benefit from treatment (statistical discrimination). We demonstrate that these two views can only be distinguished using data on patient outcomes: for patients with the same propensity to be treated, prejudice implies a higher return from treatment for treated minorities, while statistical discrimination implies that returns are equalized. Using data on heart attack treatments, we do not find empirical support for prejudice-based explanations. Despite receiving less treatment, women and blacks receive slightly lower benefits from treatment, perhaps due to higher stroke risk, delays in seeking care, and providers over-treating minorities due to equity and liability concerns.
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Jennifer Malat, Rose Clark-Hitt, Diana Jill Burgess, Greta Friedemann-Sanchez & Michelle Van Ryn
Ethnic and Racial Studies, September 2010, Pages 1431-1450
Abstract:
In this paper we report on an interdisciplinary project interviewing doctors and nurses about racial inequality in health care in the USA. We analysed data from interviews with twenty-two white doctors and nurses in which they were asked to offer explanations for racial inequality in health care. Results provide insight into how whiteness operates to provide white patients more often with appropriate health care and how colour-blind ideology can be adapted to accommodate naming white advantage and potential racial discrimination. However, even when naming mechanisms of white advantage in accessing resources, the white respondents avoided acknowledging how they are implicated in racial inequality in health care. We discuss the implications for understanding whiteness and colour-blind ideology.